


Pretend it's just you and me

by Sail_On, TheNorthRemembers



Series: Mob verse [2]
Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Abusive Relationship, Alcohol Abuse, Alternate Universe - Mob, Cheating, Dubious Consent, Explicit Sexual Content, Falling In Love, Jonny is a ray of sunshine, M/M, Murder, Past Drug Addiction, lying
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-01
Updated: 2019-06-01
Packaged: 2019-10-02 02:55:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 87,848
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17256302
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sail_On/pseuds/Sail_On, https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheNorthRemembers/pseuds/TheNorthRemembers
Summary: AddictionUK  /əˈdɪk.ʃən/ US  /əˈdɪk.ʃən/- an inability to stop doing or using something, especially something harmfulPatrick knows addiction. Has known it since he was 13 years old, getting arrested for drug possession for the first time.So really, when he meets Jonny, he should know better. He should know better than to let himself get a taste, because he knows it never stays just once. He knows that after the high comes the crash and Jonny doesn’t deserve that.Jonny is everything Patrick is not. He doesn’t lie. He talks about saving trees and becoming a doctor. He’s a good person. And Patrick can't stay away, as hard and often as he tries.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Here we go, time to start this adventure. 
> 
> First of all, I want to explain how this story was written. I wrote [part 1](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16707043) as the backstory for what was initially going to be rp, and while I fell in love with the story and took back creative decision making, most scenes were still rped in advance with [Mel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheNorthRemembers/pseuds/TheNorthRemembers). Jonny's character, backstory, and dialogue are all exclusively hers. The rest was written by me. So thank you Mel for playing along on this and helping me clean up what we had into an actual story <3
> 
> This is the second part to what should be a three-part series. It can be read separately from part 1, although I _do_ reference Patrick's backstory. Some characters (in particular Jason Cirone) are not reintroduced from scratch. Those are details, though, and I don't think that your understanding or enjoyment of the story are going to be ruined just because you skipped on part 1.
> 
> Please note that as the second part of three works this does _not_ have a happy ending but more of an open-ended hopeful one meant to set up the third.
> 
> Updates are going to happen twice a month. As of now, most of the story is written, and I know where I am going with everything, so there should be no worries about this being a WIP that gets abandoned. Expect this story to be long ;)
> 
> Just like for part 1, disclaimer that this is not a story about the real Patrick Kane or Jonathan Toews. Should you have googled yourself or know any of the people mentioned, please click away. 
> 
> This is not tagged for Jason Cirone because I picked his name at random, not as a fic for the hockey player Jason Cirone.
> 
> Detailed warnings will be added in the end notes of each chapter if needed. General warnings for the story are in the end notes.
> 
> [Here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Mafia#/media/File:Mafia_family_structure_tree.en.svg) you have a chart detailing the mob hierarchy that I'm basing this on if you get mixed up with capos, soldiers, and associates.

Ironically, Patrick’s troubles start following a street gang fight.

Patrick is leading an operation with Alfonso on a bar that a new gang has decided to set up their headquarters in, together with a handful of their associates. There was a time when Alfonso introduced Patrick to the hierarchy structures of the mob – back when Alfonso had been a soldier and Patrick an associate – but they’re now the two highest-ranking soldiers for Jason Cirone, and Patrick has his own guys. Like Felice. Patrick likes Felice.

Patrick has other projects, but working under Cirone, he still has to do one-off missions like these. There are agreements in place, silent _accordo_ s with the other mobs in Chicago, for things like turf presence. No one treads on another big group’s territory, be it geographically or in terms of industry. Here, though, there’s a group of wannabe gangsters who think that they can mount an operation right under the Italian mob’s nose.

It’s not something that the mob can let slide. DiFronzo, _the_ boss, ordered Cirone to take care of it, Cirone sent Alfonso and Patrick with however many men they wanted under the condition that they be discreet.

Seeing the men – boys, for the most part, some women – in what seems to be their main meeting point, according to Alfonso, is strangely reminiscent of Patrick’s days in Win East.

It’s probably why Patrick plays up the cockiness, pretends he’s back there and starts talking, instead of immediately charging – and it’s what costs them the surprise of the attack.

The gang members are on their feet in seconds, and Alfonso throws Patrick the most unimpressed look, but then they’re fighting, and whatever, it’s not like they won’t crush these kids anyway. Patrick just shrugs and grins at Alfonso, unrepentant, before he proceeds to slam one of the guys' head against a wall.

They’re not trying to kill here, because this isn’t worth a murder investigation. Mostly, it’s about scaring the gang away, and teaching them a lesson. If they want to move and start a new group in some other city, or on the territory of the Irish mob, they’re very welcome to do so. For now, they just have to learn the consequences of provoking the _Italian_ mob.

Patrick still gets a gun pointed at him, which he’s not overly surprised by, given the context, and rolls his eyes at. He dives on the guy who’s holding it and knocks the gun out of his hand, sending them both crashing to the ground in a mess of tangled limbs.

Patrick feels something in his left wrist _crack_ when something heavy lands on it. Someone’s heel, it turns out. He growls from the pain of it, but rolls them both over, proceeding to yank the gun out of the guy’s grip and shoot him in the shoulder with it.

Quickly, Patrick is back on his feet, aiming the gun at the rest of the room with a glove-clad hand – he’s no amateur – and that’s enough to get the remaining gang members who are still standing to freeze. He ignores the way his left wrist is hanging kind of loosely at his side, at the very least fractured, instead casually pointing the gun on each of the gang members.

“See, the thing is, when you point a gun at the mob, there tend to be causalities,” he informs them, smiling like he’s just chatting about the weather. “Just like when you step into the mob’s turf. And we wouldn’t want casualties, would we?”

He kicks the guy he’s already shot for good measure, and the guy lets out a garbled noise.

“You’re dealing with the body if you kill one of them,” Alfonso mutters.

“Who said anything about murder?” Patrick grins, before shooting one of the gang members in the knee. The guy screams and drops. “See, no murder here.”

“Yeah yeah,” Alfonso says, but his mouth is twitching like he’s supressing a smile, and Patrick knows he’s got him. Alfonso turns back towards the gang. “What he said. Cross us, and expect to see consequences. Consider yourself warned.”

Patrick points the barrel at the floor, just out of safety, and proceeds to empty its load into the wood. He’s not going to take it with him, and he doesn’t want to be shot in the back out of spite. Of course, they might have back-up ammo, but Patrick thinks the intimidation should do its job in that regard. And if not- well, he already has a trip to the hospital planned for his wrist anyway. He does a mocking salute, gun still in hand, smoking.

“To the pleasure of you never seeing us again,” he tells them.

Then he throws the gun away and walks out with the other mob members.

As soon as they’re outside, Alfonso sends Patrick a mock-aggravated look. “Do you really have to put on a show every time, kiddo?”

Patrick shrugs, but before he can say anything, Felice cuts in. “He really, really does.”

“Well, we wanted to leave an impression, didn’t we?” Patrick asks innocently.

Felice being one of Patrick’s associates, he has had more than one occasion to follow Patrick’s lead on how an operation will turn out. And, well. Patrick does like drama.

It’s not about the punching and shooting part. Patrick sees the violence as just a necessary aspect of their job. What he enjoys is theatrics. He’d be just as happy putting on a “show” at his money-laundering charity, or trying to motivate a union.

Honestly, America shouldn’t be so awful to unions. Even compared to 2007, their power has decreased a lot, and Patrick misses them.

“Don’t you have your own gun, by the way?” Felice asks.

Patrick blinks, and, right. He does. In the back of his pants, hidden by his suit jacket. Using the gun hadn’t been the plan, given the no-kill order, so he hadn’t really kept in mind that it was an option when he had gone for the gangster’s weapon. Given that bullets from unaccounted guns at a crime scene are something to avoid, though, it’s all for the better.

“I was proving a _point_ ,” he informs Felice and Alfonso. They’ve reached their two cars, and Patrick eyes them critically. “You guys go ahead without me, I’m gonna head to the hospital.”

He’s pretty good at ignoring things that hurt, but hands are useful and he does want his fixed.

Quickly, he takes his gloves off, shoving them in his back pocket. When he raises his left wrist and eyes it suspiciously, it makes the pain flare up, which is probably a bad sign. From the outside, it looks fine enough, except for the dirt on it and maybe some hint of bruising, but you never know.

“Just come back to HQ with us, Mrs. Sharp will have a look at you,” Felice says.

“Nah,” Patrick drawls. “I’ll start using the mob doctor when we hire a man.”

One of the associates laughs crassly, and Alfonso rolls his eyes. Felice just shrugs, used to Patrick making up new excuses not to see Abby Sharp each time.

“Suit yourself.”

Patrick salutes again, hands Alfredo his gun in exchange for his wallet that he'd left it in the car, and then they’re off. He pulls his phone out of his pocket and calls himself a cab instead.

The thing is, he does like Abby Sharp. She’s a great person, who probably would never have set a foot in the mob if her husband wasn’t neck-deep already. And Patrick knows with absolute certainty that she’s more than capable and probably smarter than he is. But he can’t stand the _sad eyes_ she gets every time she sees him come in with an injury.

It’s been like this ever since his lung went into failure in 2009, following his last relapse. She thinks that he’s some poor kid that just suffered from drugs and a poor childhood, and he hates it. She’s not his mother, doesn’t have any responsibility for him, and she has no business looking so sad whenever he gets hurt. It’s part of his job description – part of her _husband’s_ job description. Patrick doesn’t need her pity.

So he avoids her office. He does cross paths with her, when he hangs out with Sharpy, and it’s perfectly cool, but Patrick won’t use Abby as his doctor. He doesn’t think she understands, but that doesn’t matter.

He hasn’t been shot in a while, which is good, because that’s not something he can go to a public hospital for. For the rest, he has a system now, where he changes hospital every time he’s injured enough to need one, just so none of them keep medical records for him that are too heavy and might result in suspicions about his life style. He’s supposed to be a normal business man, not someone who looks like he’s been in a fight every couple of months.

Flipping through his phone, he quickly decides that this time he’ll pay Chicago University hospital a visit, and gives the cab driver the directions.

Once he’s at the ER, he signs in at the desk and walks over to the waiting area, perfectly aware that his situation isn’t urgent enough for them to take a look at him before at least a couple of hours of wait. It’s boring, and he wishes he had a book with him. He doesn’t, though, so he sits down on one of the plastic chairs and calls Jason instead.

Jason, who used to be Cirone to Patrick, and still is in public. But they’re nearing five years since Patrick joined the mob, which is about the same time that he’s spent getting fucked by Jason on the regular, and they’re far past that stage. Patrick knows that Jason cares about him now, in whatever way it is that Jason cares about people. Patrick is part of Jason’s personal collection of things, something that Jason considers precious and his.

He got that confirmation in 2009, when he had relapsed, and he had spent a week in hospital with a crack lung. In no way would Patrick’s salary have held up that sort of expense, not when he sends most of his money to his sisters, but Jason had covered it for him, on top of visiting and making sure that Patrick stayed clean afterwards.

Patrick hasn’t touched crack since. He has made sure to keep himself and his body in check, replacing the drugs with exercise, limiting his diet to strictly healthy things, doing his best to control the one vessel he’s been given. And Jason appreciates that Patrick has put on muscle, that’s for sure.

“Just a heads up,” Patrick tells him, “I’m at the hospital. Fucked up my wrist when I was out with Alfonso.”

“Anything bad?” Jason asks immediately, and Patrick smiles a little. It’s amusing when Jason sounds like he’s worrying about him.

“Aah, I’m bleeding out, boss,” he drawls dramatically. “They’ve got me. It’s- I think this is it…”

“ _Patrick_.”

Patrick laughs. “Not believable?”

“Not in the slightest.”

“Okay then, I’ll have to work on my dramatic voice.” Patrick sticks his tongue out to the little kid on the bench in front of him who’s looking at him with wide eyes, eyes crinkling at the corners. “Yes, I’m fine, it’s probably just sprained. Worst case, it’s broken, they’ll give me a cast.”

“Good.” Jason sounds satisfied. “Call me again when you’re done.”

“Yes boss,” Patrick says cheerfully, and gets hung up on for his troubles.

Then, he settles in for the wait.

His eyes track the nurses automatically every time they call someone up, for lack of a better thing to do. He makes faces at the kid, sometimes, types away on his phone. Waiting rooms are something he could avoid if he just went to see Abby, but he doesn’t mind the wait. Sure, he can get impatient if he’s waiting for something particularly exciting, but his insomnia has hardened him up against boredom. Sometimes, you just have to settle in for the long haul and let your brain do its thing.

It’s maybe an hour into his wait that someone calls the name “Gloria Mendoza”. It’s a different guy again, maybe the third person to have been calling patients’ names since Patrick got there, and Patrick’s eyes skim over him without much interest at first, other than a vague note that he guy is definitely pleasing to the eye. He glances back down at his phone. Thank god for the fact that it’s his left wrist that’s fucked. Having to type with his left would definitely be closer to annoying otherwise.

Then the guy has to call the name again.

“Mrs. Gloria Mendoza?”

Patrick goes to looking around the room, where different people are waiting. He makes another face at the little girl in front of him, and she giggles, but nobody reacts to the name. Patrick looks back at the nurse.

The recognition hits him, this time. It’s one of the guys Patrick used to play hockey with six years ago, back when he’d tried to go to college and get his life together. They were on the same line for a while, even if they weren’t actual friends. It feels so far away now, so different from what Patrick’s life is like. He shot two guys just an hour ago. Seeing someone from college again is just bizarre.

Patrick barely has time to wonder if the guy would recognise him in return when their eyes lock, and he – Jonny Taves, Patrick’s brain finally manages to fill in – stops. Jonny’s face doesn’t as much as twitch, but he doesn’t look away either, blinking like he’s trying to process who Patrick is, or where he knows him from. Patrick gives him a polite smile, unsure of whether he actually wants any sort of interaction with the guy. College was a bad time for Patrick. He doesn’t really need the reminder, or any of the catching up that could be done with buddies from back then.

Jonny looks back down at his clipboard. “Mr. Hank Depcik?”

An elderly man, who seems to be struggling to walk, gets up. Patrick guesses that this would be the wrong place to catch up anyway, which he’s both relieved, and maybe also disappointed by. Patrick likes people. Finding out what someone he knew that long ago has been up to sounds more than a little interesting.

Either way, Jonny is working, and he’s not going to chitchat with a patient while he is. He might get to call up Patrick’s name later, but that’s pretty much going to be it. Patrick looks back down at his phone and thinks to himself that at least, time seems to have treated Jonny well. He looks _good_.

After the next patient gets called, though, Jonny is back, and he does call Patrick’s name. Patrick can’t help an amused shake of the head before he gets up.

“Follow me?” Jonny asks, and this time, he gives Patrick a tiny, crooked smile.

It’s a very good smile, Patrick thinks privately.

“I’d be honoured,” Patrick says loftily.

He follows Jonny out of the waiting room, towards some sort of examination area where the beds are separated by means of light grey curtains. The surreal feeling still hasn’t left, with every glance in Jonny’s direction giving Patrick flashes of 2007, but at least it’s just Jonny. Not Ty, not anyone who used to be important to him. There’s something fun about that too.

“If you may,” Jonny says, gesturing towards the bed he’s lead Patrick to before pulling over a stool to sit down on.

Patrick follows suit, feet dangling from the bed once he’s sitting, only brushing the ground with the tip of his shoes. He wants to fold his hands in his lap, but that action seems a little compromised, so he settles for smoothing out his slacks with his right and smiling at Jonny, eyes twinkling at Jonny’s formality. He’s fairly certain Jonny recognises him by now, and Patrick is curious to see if Jonny will bring it up at all.

“So.” Jonny gives Patrick another smile. “This is when I'm supposed to introduce myself to you and inform you that I'm just a med student, as you can see.”

Patrick points to his name tag, that reads _J. Toews, medical student_. Patrick’s eyes stop at the name plate, and he squints, because _Toews_? That doesn’t seem right. He’s pretty sure that he remembers Jonny’s last name being Taves. He opens his mouth to comment on it, but then Jonny rambles on, a little bit stilted, a little bit charming, and Patrick switches to watching him curiously.

“I don't know if you remember me, but we played hockey together a couple of years ago.” Patrick fistpumps internally. Called it. “And-“ Jonny picks up his form, scans it quickly. “You are here for your wrist? It doesn't say how you hurt it.”

“Your name should be written differently,” Patrick says, deciding that he wants to get that one out first, just to test out the waters and how well Jonny responds to teasing. Jonny blinks at him. He grins. “Like, T-A-V-E-S. Or pronounced differently. People have to say your name wrong _all_ the time, man.”

“It should, eh?” Jonny asks, wry smile playing around his lips. Then he shakes his head. “I get that a lot. It's a German surname of Russian Mennonite origin, according to my father, but please don't ask me what _that_ means, because I have no idea.”

He nods towards Patrick’s wrist, keeping them on track for the injury treatment part. Which is less fun but probably a good sign of Jonny’s professionalism. Patrick quickly shoulders off his suit jacket, pulling up the sleeve of his shirt to free his left wrist.

He still mouthes _Russian Mennonite_ quietly, because he literally has no idea what that is supposed to mean, and the way Jonny talks like it’s no big deal is a little bit hot. Hell, Patrick is definitely digging the whole doctor look Jonny has going on. Even if he’s still a student.

“Unfortunate scuffling incident at the bar,” he tells Jonny brightly, holding up his bruised wrist. “I fell, it got stepped on, here I am.”

Jonny hums, reaching out to carefully lift Patrick’s wrist. His fingers are firm, in that gentle way that doctors usually have. They’re also long and quite nice to look at.  

“A bar fight, eh?” Jonny says, fingers squeezing Patrick’s wrist ever-so-slightly, like he’s trying to feel what’s happening through the skin. He’s got a line in his brow like he’s concentrating. “After work party?”

He looks up again, just fleetingly eyeing the way Patrick is dressed. The slacks and dress shirt certainly don’t speak of any sort of frat party. Patrick’s entire right arm being covered in tattoos tend to throw people off from the entirely professional look that suits and slicked-back hair can give off, but they’re hidden under his sleeve right now.

The tattoos usually add to Patrick’s mobster vibe, so it’s good that they’re not visible now. Not that people are particularly perceptive when they don’t expect something, and if there’s one thing that they don’t expect, it’s that a 23-year-old kid works for the Italian mob. Maybe the Irish one, because of the blonde hair and freckles, but then Patrick might have to shoot anyone who accused him of that. For honour reasons. Their relationship to the Irish mob is tense at best, and Patrick does have _some_ sense of loyalty, at least to the organisation.

Either way, he can’t have Jonny make any correct assumptions here, and the best way around that has always been to lie. Which is in no way an inconvenience, because Patrick loves to spin stories. He already has the first outline of one from admitting that he got his wrist stepped on in a bar (all true) and Jonny’s suggestion of a bar fight (also true, if not in the way Jonny is thinking).

“I was an innocent bystander,” he protests, popping his dimples at Jonny.

He taps his fingers against his knee with his uninjured hand, testing the lie on the tip of his tongue. Making up a story is definitely a lot more fun than the last hour he’s spent waiting in the ER waiting area has been, whether there were cute kids to make faces to or not. Conscious of Jonny’s eyes on him, he brushes his hair back, tucking a stray curl behind his ear. Unfortunately, gel isn’t enough to keep them in place during fights.

“Went out with a few work buddies, and then there was this group of dudes, right?” he says, already picturing the scene in his head. All he has to do is take the bar he was actually at and replace the gang with civilians. “Drunk, looking for trouble. And they started bothering this lady, which my friend – Felice – thought wasn’t too cool. Possibly because he had the hots for her himself, but you know how it is. It’s better to help out for bad reasons than not at all.”

Jonny gives him an amused smile. His fingers are still on Patrick’s wrist, feeling around, which doesn’t hurt as long as Jonny doesn’t get too close to the left side. Patrick doesn’t think Jonny needs to touch him for that long without running any other tests, but maybe he’s just curious about Patrick’s story. Which he should be, because Patrick’s story telling is awesome.

“Except Felice obviously couldn’t take on these guys himself,” Patrick continues cheerfully. “So he dragged me into it. Drunk guys didn’t like getting told off, one of them shoved me back, Felice stepped on my wrist, and ta-dah. Here I am. And like the great friend he is, Felice stayed to reassure the poor lady rather than escort his maimed coworker to the hospital.” He holds his breath dramatically, before letting it go in one long exhale. Grins at Jonny cheekily.

It might be slightly over-the-top, but then that’s just how Patrick rolls sometimes. He’s an over-the-top kind of guy. It makes it harder to discern when he’s exaggerating for the sake of it, lying, or the truth actually is that entertaining. And any sort of story that involves getting into a fight needs _some_ sort of drama. Just for the flair of it.

“So you are quite the hero, then, huh?” Jonny comments, lifting one eyebrow like he’s judging Patrick a little bit. Or maybe it’s Felice that he’s judging. His hands have completely stilled on Patrick’s wrist now. “Since you didn’t do it just to get into some lady’s pants, but to help out your friend. Too bad, your friend doesn’t seem to be quite as loyal.”

Patrick laughs easily. “No, dude, I told him to stay. I’m a big boy.” And Felice is actually a pretty alright dude, who’ll definitely have a laugh when Patrick tells him that he accused him of defending innocent girls in bars. Maybe Felice will even do it for real next time, just for the irony of it. As long as Patrick doesn’t need to get any body parts injured again. “And the girl looked like she needed company more than I did. Plus-“ He halts, grinning at Jonny a little. “I have great company _now_.”

Jonny blinks, ever-so-slightly, before – Jesus, is that a blush? Patrick is absolutely delighted. He remembers Jonny as this cold guy who screamed more than he talked on the ice, but right now he seems closer to someone Patrick could ask out for coffee, and who’d actually say yes. If, you know. Patrick was single and available to date men. For now though, he’s definitely having fun, and it hasn’t even been ten full minutes.

“I’m not sure the ER counts as company,” Jonny says dryly.

Patrick shrugs. “Maybe not usually. But you don’t usually catch up with old friends you haven’t seen in years at the ER either.”

“It’s definitely been a while.” Jonny smiles, a little more openly now, and moves his hands against Patrick’s wrist again. “Now, tell me if it hurts if you wiggle your fingers.” He presses one finger against Patrick’s wrist gently. “Any tingling or numbness?”

While the pressure point against the swelling is a little weird – wobbly in the bone, Patrick isn’t quite sure how to place the feeling – it doesn’t do anything until Patrick tries to actually wiggle his fingers. Then the pain flares up. It shoots all the way through his forearm, concentrated on the underside of the wrist, sharp where Jonny’s finger is resting.

“Yeah, that sort of hurts,” Patrick admits, shrugging a little. “Not great.” He wiggles his fingers again to test it out, and yeah. Hurts just as bad the second time around. “I’m going to stop doing that, if you don’t mind.” He pauses, considering. “And my hand feels kinda weird when you’re holding it like that but it doesn’t feel numb.”

“You’ve got quite the pain threshold, eh?” Jonny asks, Canadian accent slipping into his words and causing Patrick to shake his head internally. It’s a goddamn tragedy. Someone so handsome shouldn’t be Canadian.

“Do I get candy for being good?” Patrick asks, batting his lashes at Jonny.

Jonny laughs, and it makes Patrick feel a little proud, the way he always does when he manages to make people laugh. At the same time, though, there’s a different kind of thrill there, because the people Patrick gets to laugh usually aren’t guys his age with killer smiles. Patrick doesn’t have the time to _flirt_.

Jonny puts Patrick’s hand back down in his lap, careful as ever.

“I’m sure we have some lollipops around here,” he says, corner of his mouth curling up. “You know, usually those are for the particularly brave kids but I’m sure we can make an exception.”

“I’m very brave,” Patrick points out. “I don’t see how you would be making an exception.”

Jonny rolls his eyes, but Patrick can see right through him. He totally thinks Patrick is hilarious. “I’ll see what I can do, then.”

“Mr. Toews,” a stern-looking woman suddenly cuts in, pushing the curtain open to look at Jonny with raised eyebrows. “Less chit-chat and more treating patients. What have we got? Present the case to me.”

Jonny flinches, ever-so-slightly, and he turns around towards the doctor, clipboard held tightly between his fingers. Patrick feels a pang of guilt at distracting Jonny like this at work. This is the ER, there’s probably other people waiting for assistance who have it much worse than a fucked up wrist. He shuts his mouth, dangling his feet off the bed.

“23-year-old male, presented with a tender, and swollen wrist after mild trauma, due to… being stepped on,” Jonny starts rattling down, going over his examination, his thought process, and eventually ending in his conclusion. “Going from my examination, my guess would be-”

“Your guess?” The doctor raises her eyebrows. “We don’t guess.”

Jonny exhales visibly, pressing his lips together for a moment. Patrick sort of wants to imitate the motion, or at least lift his eyebrows at the doctor. She has exhaustion lines around her eyes and looks high-strung in a way that suggests that she’s overworked, but still, her words are a little too clipped for Patrick to let it slide entirely. Plus, she’s ruining his fun.

“Going from my examination, I would strongly _suspect_ ,” Jonny corrects himself, “that the patient is suffering from a distal radius fracture. Non-displaced and stable.”

Fracture, then. Patrick sighs internally. That probably means that he’ll have to wear a brace for a couple weeks. He’s going to have to ask Jason to cut down on his ground work. Or make sure he only goes on jobs where the negotiations aren’t too likely to deteriorate. That big arms shipment that New York’s Rosati are expecting? Yeah, Patrick is going to be out for most of that. At least his gun hand is still functional.

The doctor doesn’t even look at Patrick, her eyes solely focused on Jonny, which suits Patrick just fine. “And how would you proceed?”

“I’d do an x-ray to confirm the diagnosis, and determine whether or not any intervention apart from a stabilizing brace is necessary,” Jonny answers, and then, like an afterthought adds, “Oh, and ask you to prescribe pain medication, probably a strong Ibuprofen. And recommend cooling of the wrist.”

The doctor – Dr. Werth, her nameplate reads – nods, her expression not expressing much of anything, but she takes the clipboard from Jonny’s hands, skimming over Patrick’s information and what Jonny wrote down.

“I’ll examine the patient now,” she says, giving Jonny a pointed look. “Call radiology and sign him up.  Whether or not I confirm your diagnosis, I’ll want an x-ray.”

 

~~~

 

It’s Jonny who takes Patrick to the x-ray room, once Dr. Werth is done examining Patrick’s wrist, giving the same diagnosis as Jonny had. Patrick can tell that Jonny is proud of himself for that, although he doesn’t show it under the steel gaze of Dr. Werth. Then, his chest inflates a little and he grins to himself, looking down at the ground. It’s cute.

“She’s been here since 6am. Double shift,” he tells Patrick once she’s gone and they’re walking towards the x-ray room. “She’s not usually as… abrasive.”

Suddenly, he seems to remember something, brightening up as he fumbles behind himself to reach into the back pocket of his scrubs. They’re blue and ugly, straining to contain Jonny’s ass, which Patrick’s eyes linger on for longer than what is probably strictly polite. There’s definitely nothing ugly about Jonny’s ass. It’s closer to something akin to a religious experience, honestly. Something worth admiring. Patrick nearly regrets that they’re walking side by side and he can’t spend their short journey staring at Jonny’s ass.

When he looks up again, Jonny is holding out a lollipop to him, smiling victoriously.

“Would you care for some candy to sweeten the long journey to radiology?”

Patrick laughs, more than a little charmed, both by the gesture, and Jonny’s self-satisfied little smile.  He steels the lollipop out of Jonny’s hand gleefully, fingers brushing against Jonny’s on the way, and flashes his dimples at him.

“Candy,” he cheers. “My day has been saved.”

Jonny looks extremely pleased with himself, which is adorable, and Patrick is a little disappointed when it turns out they’re already at the x-ray room. He should file a report to the hospital to complain about the attractive med students not being made available to patients for longer periods of time. Bribe them. Something.

“I called for a hand x-ray for Mr. Patrick Kane?” Jonny says, stepping up to the radiology reception lady.

He explains to Patrick how the x-ray is going to go, which Patrick vaguely nods through, already familiar with the process, and then he’s being led into the x-ray room.

“Look,” Jonny tells Patrick excitedly as soon as the x-ray is done, stepping up next to him so he can hold it against the light. “See, that?” He points to one of the bones, and the fine line going through it. “That’s a distal radius fracture. I was right.”

Patrick grins. “Good job. Always good when my injuries can get some school kids to learn.”

Jonny rolls his eyes, but doesn’t seem particularly offended. Patrick likes it. Teasing Jonny feels more like comfortable banter than anything else.

“Well, on behalf of me and the kids, where should I send the 'thank you for helping me learn' card then?” Jonny drawls. Patrick’s laugh causes the corner of his mouth to curl up further. “Also maybe lay off of mouthing off to people who may step on your wrist for the next six weeks, yeah?”

“You sound like my co-worker, don’t be a hater.” Jonny rolls his eyes harder, which is absolutely delightful. Patrick might be a little bit in love. “I guess I can try to only mouth off to people who don’t step on people’s wrists,” he allows. “For six weeks. After that I’m sure I’ll be right back under your care.”

“Maybe you should try not mouthing off to anyone,” Jonny suggests. “Although I’m getting the feeling that might not be so easy for you, eh?”

Patrick nods, deadpan. “It’s really hard.”

Jonny gets this near-pained look on his face like he really, really wants to answer something, but can’t in presence of the other people in the room, and Patrick has to suppress a giggle.

After Dr. Werth has confirmed the diagnosis, he gets a strong dosage of Ibuprofen prescribed that he slides into his pocket for later use, in case he needs painkillers for something that _really_ hurts. Abby doesn’t like to prescribe him pain killers, because she’s convinced that Patrick is prone to addiction to pretty much anything. It’s bullshit, in Patrick’s opinion. He’s only ever been addicted to crack, and it’s not like he has no self-control on other things. He’s got his life together, thank you very much, Abby.

He’s also told that he’ll have to wear a brace for six weeks, which Patrick winces at, because six weeks are definitely way too long, and that he needs to see his orthopaedic surgeon at the end of it, to make sure everything is alright. He waits at the front desk for Jonny to get him the brace from wherever the hospital keeps their spare medical equipment. It takes Jonny a while, but when he’s back, he helps Patrick put the brace on, which involves more touching and holding Patrick’s elbow as Patrick tests whether he can move his fingers in the brace.

“Sorry, couldn't find the right size at first,” Jonny says, a little breathless as he helps Patrick into the brace. “Don't do them any tighter than this, you don't want to restrict blood flow.”

He shows Patrick the setting of the Velcro, and Patrick nods, ready to be sent off so Jonny can go back to working. He appreciates Jonny half holding his hand, but they both have other shit to do after this, unfortunately. He’s already opening his mouth to thank Jonny and tell him goodbye – not ask him out to “catch up”, because that would be irresponsible – when Jonny interrupts his train of thought.

“Oh, the ones you back in college multiplied I see,” he says, nudging Patrick’s right arm. Patrick follows Jonny’s gaze down to his right arm, where his shirt has slipped up his forearm, revealing the start of his tattoo sleeve. “Guess it's right what they say about tattoos being addictive.”

Patrick snorts internally at Jonny’s choice of words. Outwardly, he wiggles his eyebrows.

“Better than doing meth, at least.”

His forearm is mostly covered in the three big flowers he picked to remember his sisters after cutting off all contact with them, which is absolutely cheesy and something he doesn’t plan on telling a living soul, ever. What’s interesting, though, is that Jonny even remembers that Patrick already had tattoos back in college. He wonders if Jonny noticed him more than Patrick had him in return, back then. It’s a flattering thought.

Jonny barks out a laugh. “Tattoos, unlike meth don't mess with your non-neural brain cells, so yeah, definitely better.”

Someone at the other end of the corridor calls for Jonny, who looks over his shoulder, frowning. Patrick laughs. It’s cute that Jonny seems so unwilling to actually leave.

“No, but you can get blood poisoning if it’s not done well,” he informs Jonny. “But I’m not gonna keep you any longer. Go do your job, Jonny Taves.”

Jonny smiles, eyes crinkling at the corners.

“Have a good night, and take care of that wrist for me, eh?”

“I will, I will. See you around.”

Patrick waves at him a little, before spinning on his heels and finally making for the exit. Behind him, he can hear one of Jonny’s coworkers catching up to him and starting to talk in hushed whispers. Patrick shakes his head, grinning at his shoes as he walks.

 

~~~

 

He doesn’t find the note until the cab ride back to Trump tower.

He knows he’s supposed to call Jason, since he’s done now, but he doesn’t want to do it in the cab, and he’s still basking in the feeling of normalcy that came from talking to Jonny. Jonny, who’s just a med student at the hospital, and made Patrick feel more at ease during the 20 minutes they spent together than any of his friends do.

God, Patrick loves civilians sometimes. He can’t fit in with them without lying his ass off, but there’s something so simple and wholesome about people who think meth is a joke and probably haven’t held a gun in their entire lives. It’s why Patrick likes working with unions so much, why his charity thing is so fun. He doesn’t just get to talk to people and put on a show – he gets to talk to people who he doesn’t have to constantly second-guess. Even Sharpy, who’s arguably Patrick’s closest friend these days, is still someone Patrick knows could stab him in the back.

With Jonny it’s different. There’s the non-work part of it, but Patrick has been to hospitals before. He talks to his cashier sometimes, or to the doorman in his building. But this time there had been actual flirting, Jonny blushing at half the things Patrick was saying, and it had felt so _easy_. Jonny doesn’t know anything about Patrick. He doesn’t think Patrick is a child, doesn’t have any second intentions, he just thought that Patrick was hot and possibly funny. The second one potentially being because of the first, but still.

Patrick doesn’t remember the last time someone who he could actually potentially be interested in flirted with him, and that’s pretty fucking sad. But it also makes the last 20 minutes pretty fucking great, considering. Patrick allows himself to lie back and close his eyes for a moment, imagining a life where he’s single and could have just asked for Jonny’s number. Maybe even taken Jonny home and had sex, easy like their conversation had been. It’s a nice fantasy. More so than calling his pedo boss who’ll probably want to come over as soon as they hang up so he can get in a quick fuck before going home to his wife and kids.

Patrick ends up checking out the brace’s box, to occupy his hands more than anything else, and so he doesn’t feel as guilty for putting off calling Jason. Thinks briefly back to Jonny’s mannerism when he had handed it to him, like he was nervous about something. There’s an instruction leaflet inside, as announced, but also a sticky note taped to the side. It’s a phone number, with a few words scribbled underneath.

_In case you want to catch up over coffee or something._

_-J_

Patrick stares a few seconds, dumbfounded. Then a slow, delighted smile steals its way onto his face. Just because he’d let himself imagine maybe asking Jonny for his number in another life doesn’t mean he’s really, genuinely considered it in this one, and yet here it is. Jonny’s number.

Except that Patrick immediately feels silly for the happy, bubbly feeling inside his stomach, because what is he going to do about it? He already knew Jonny was interested. This doesn’t actually change anything. He’s still going back to the condo Jason got him, is still going to call Jason as soon as he’s back there, and will still let Jason decide whether he wants to mount Patrick like a bitch or put him on his knees instead.

Suddenly, Patrick is regretting this entire Jonny thing. It’s not exactly making Jason look better in comparison. And the only reason Patrick doesn’t mind the sex these days, is because he’s used to it and it takes care of his need for physical touch. He’s lonely enough without adding touch starvation to the list. And Jason does know how to make Patrick feel good, even if he’s sort of limited in the sense that Patrick isn’t attracted to him. Still isn’t, not after all these years. He runs a tired hand over his face.

When he’s home, he calls Jason.

And when he finds himself riding Jason’s lap, arm swung loosely around Jason’s shoulder, he does think of Jonny again. Wonders how it would fit to sit in his lap instead, try to coax noises out of Jonny’s mouth through the irregular grinding of his hips. Bite at his neck and leave a mark where he can’t with Jason, because Jason has a wife.

It’s Jonny because Patrick doesn’t really have anyone else to imagine, or at least not anyone that had ever seemed so readily available, but it would be a lie to say that this is the first time Patrick fucks himself on Jason’s cock thinking about someone else. He doesn’t even feel bad for it.

He lets Jason get him off, come inside of him, and then sprawls out on the bed, bedsheets tangled in his legs, so Jason can watch the come seep out of Patrick while he gets dressed again. He says something about Patrick needing to cool his wrist, and Patrick makes a non-committal noise, already reaching for his phone and thumbing through it. Jason kisses his ass cheek in good night, and Patrick throws back a “sleep well, don’t let Elisa catch you,” over his shoulder, before grabbing Jonny’s note out of the box.

He’s already typing the number into his phone when Jason finally leaves the room, locks after himself because of course he has the keys to this place. It belongs to him. He placed Patrick inside a condo Patrick couldn’t afford himself, because Patrick is as much his property as anything else in here.

He saves Jonny as _Jonny Taves_ , just so he can have a little laugh with himself, and then types out a message. Not because he’s trying to get on Jonny’s dick – although he wouldn’t mind that either – but because Jonny was nice, and imagining his face during sex is kind of doing it for Patrick, so he might as well see more of it. Get more fodder for his imagination.

 _or something?_ he types, smirking at his screen a little, because just because he won’t sleep with Jonny doesn’t mean he won’t flirt with him.

 _coffee or something_ sure as hell sounded like an invitation.

He signs with _Patrick_ , and nearly presses send before he thinks better of it. Patrick is the name the people in the mob know him by. It’s the name he’s gone by for the past five years, but it’s still his work name. And, well. Jonny probably still knows him as Pat. So he presses delete and leaves just the _Pat_ instead, thinking to himself that if he’s going to pretend like Jonny is something he can have, he might as well pretend he’s the Pat that went to college thinking he could escape criminal life.

Patrick gets up after pressing send, and stretches, before eyeing the shower. He needs to get clean because getting more come on his sheets is just gross, and it’s currently in the process of trickling down his legs. There’s also a wet patch from Patrick’s, and some of it on his stomach, which sucks because Patrick doesn’t know how he’s supposed to change the sheets when he’s just got one free hand to use.

Part of him wishes Jason had stayed for more than just fucking him and actually helped some, but asking him to change the sheets might have been a little too lowly for him. Patrick is pretty sure Jason doesn’t do any house work at home either. It’s what wives are for, after all. And boytoys, or whatever Patrick is to him. Patrick sighs. He’ll just sleep on the other side of the – thankfully King-sized – bed for tonight, but if this happens tomorrow again, or even the day after that, it’s going to get annoying.

It’s probably the time to test his resourcefulness and see if he can manage to change sheets with like, one hand and his elbow. Or just pressing his left hand on top the sheets to keep them in place as the does the rest with his good hand. Or not make the bed at all and just throw the sheets on top of the mattress as-is. Point is, he’ll figure something out.

He takes the brace off outside the shower and then steps inside. He manages, mostly, even if his wrist already feels tender without moving it, and everything requires a little more thinking than usual. He manages to get clean enough, though, and once he’s properly towelled off, he fastens the brace back on. He slips on sweatpants and a clean-smelling shirt before flopping right back down on the bed, on the clean side.

Jonny’s answered, he notices, and he opens the message, smile already creeping back on his face.

_[From: Jonny Taves]_

_Yeah. In case there’s something other than coffee you want_.

Patrick lets out a breath of laughter, delighted by the straight-forwardness. Jonny fucking wants him.

And it does sound really tempting to just up the flirting right here, right now. It’d be fun, and Patrick wants to see how explicit he can get Jonny to be about what he wants to do with Patrick. Does Jonny do sexting? Patrick wants to see if Jonny can manage to be smooth about it, or if it’ll keep being vaguely provocative honesty. Patrick honestly wouldn’t mind more of this. Honesty is refreshing, and just the thought of Jonny wanting to put his dick inside Patrick is enough to please Patrick.

But he also can’t promise Jonny that he’ll sleep with him. Or, well. He could. But then Jonny would get pissed pretty fast when it turned out that Patrick wasn’t putting out. Because he’s not going to. It’s the unfortunate consequence of sleeping with his murderous mafia boss. Patrick isn’t exactly available to date or even sleep around. Taking things slow is unfortunately the better option if he wants to see Jonny again more than once.

_[To: Jonny Taves]_

_Smooth :)_

_Im good wth coffee ;)_

Coffee is a good place to start. And finish. There’s no next step, Patrick reminds himself. He’s just- going to look at the face of the person he just had an orgasm to. And maybe try to be friends. Which is a perfectly fine thing to do.

Patrick isn’t breaking any rules yet.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter warnings:**  
>  \- Violence: Patrick shoots a guy in the knee with a gun, gets his wrist stepped on and broken  
> \- Hospitals: Descriptions of the ER and treatment for a broken wrist


	2. Chapter 2

The next morning, Patrick shows up at the Showtime facilities, his charity, and he immediately gets crowded by Temi and Shawsy, his two favourite associates (sorry Felice) who ask to see his arm like it’s some big battle wound. Shawsy proceeds to poke at Patrick’s brace like an idiot, so Patrick bats his hand away and rolls his eyes.

“Stop bothering me,” he orders. “Get me coffee instead.”

“Uhm, you’re not our boss,” Shawsy says, and Patrick shrugs.

“I kinda am. Now shoo.”

He isn’t really, in the sense that all associates answer to all soldiers, but Patrick is still one step higher in the hierarchy, and they’re on his project. Which he mounted all on his own.

He has a small staff of five, discounting himself, and Shawsy and Temi are the only two that work for the mob full-time, but that’s mostly enough. There’s Amelie, who handles PR and knows about the money laundering, because it’s her job to cover that up, and there’s Elliot and Lucy, who do most of the event management and help Amelie with PR and live in blissful ignorance. Shawsy’s on the team with them, and he makes sure that they keep believing that they’re working on this wonderfully selfless project that is helping young children in Chicago do sports.

Temi works with Patrick on the finances, which is where they deal with the money coming in and out. Patrick makes sure enough goes to charity that they don’t raise suspicion (mostly just the money they get from legitimate donators), and pays the rest into obscure funds that can be then accessed by Jason. It all works out very neatly, because the identity of donators is protected under US law, and they can’t check if the money Patrick and Temi are funnelling into the system has been made cleanly or not. Still, it’s quite a bit of work, so Patrick leaves Temi there full-time more often than not, and he’s been considering adding someone to his team.

Especially since Patrick himself spends a little too much time peeking into the PR department of the office, asking Amelie about her projects and suggesting things. He writes some of the statements or stuff they put up on the website, and really, they’re all kinda doing each other’s jobs at times, but web designer is nobody’s strength here, so it’s a little sad-looking. Still, Patrick writes things and does press releases, because he knows who to ask if he wants some information to be spread, and because he likes to control his public image. So really, he has plenty to do here. There’s more than one full-time job in this office.  

There’s a dinner tonight, though, with Jason and Sharpy and the underboss, Salvatore “Sammy Cards” Cataudella, who replaced Joe “the builder” around the time Patrick relapsed, as well as with a few big guys in the police, as those things go. Patrick’s still kind of bitter that he ever had to go to juvie if law enforcement is as corrupt as he’s come to understand here, but no, they don’t care about the small fry. This is just “friendly partnership” so that the mob doesn’t get into too much trouble. And the police likes to think that they’re keeping an eye on them that way, like they could ever root out the mob. Boy, have they tried.

The dinner means Patrick can’t spend the whole day at the charity, but he does get to be there for most of it, and he has already been scrolling through stats lines for the next arrival of “donations” for a couple of hours when his phone dings with an answer from Jonny. Patrick doesn’t check right away, because if he starts getting distracted while doing maths, he’s just going to mess up and have to start over, but as soon as he’s sure of the exact sum that they’ll be taking in – it can never get over a certain amount without being suspicious, sadly – he pulls out his phone.

_[From: Jonny Taves]_

_Coffee it is then._

_Are you free today?_

Patrick hums thoughtfully. His work hours are pretty flexible, with the whole start-up format that they have and how Patrick has to do other gigs for Jason all the time, so he technically _could_ meet Jonny for coffee. He’ll just have to leave his office later and catch up on some of the things he won’t be able to do tonight because of the dinner tomorrow. Patrick is legitimately excited at the thought of seeing Jonny again and hanging out with someone for fun. And that’s before even getting into hotness territory.

He takes a sip from the coffee on the table next to him and smiles around the edge of the cup.

_flexbl work hrs_ , he types in answer.

_say when? :))_

It barely takes half a minute before Jonny answers, three texts in quick succession.

_[From: Jonny Taves]_

_I’ve got class until 3._

_Nothing after that until 8. Where do you want to go?_

_:)_

The smiley is very cute. Five hours does sound like a lot, though, Patrick thinks to himself as he looks at Jonny’s answer. He can’t take five hours off work. There’s money to extort. People to fool into thinking what they do is legit. Funds to utilise to pay his non-mobster employees and organise charity games. And donations to Chicago schools. Stuff.

It’s a pretty flexible time frame, though, so he shrugs and settles for the easiest.

_[To: Jonny Taves]_

_Ill pick u up on campus aftr class ^^_

_just tell me ur building_

He hasn’t been to a university campus in years, so why not? It’s quicker that way, and Patrick can look around a bit. He thinks campus isn’t too far off either if he takes the car. If Jonny doesn’t want to stay on campus they can always go somewhere else. Patrick can impress him with his sick ride or something. Make Jonny swoon. Most of the younger guys in the mob agree with Patrick that his car is awesome, so why wouldn’t Jonny? Pat totally has driving one-handed down by now anyway.

 

~~~

 

He does show up at 3 pm in front of Jonny’s class building – or, well, 3:13, but that’s just being fashionably late, not Patrick getting stuck researching cool kiddo projects around Chicago and leaving too late – and there’s a sort of curious excitement bubbling up in his chest, because this is so _weird_ and outside his normal range of activities. Just hanging out. Getting coffee. It’s kind of great.

When he spots Jonny, next to some red-cheeked guy who’s talking to him animatedly, he grins and runs a hand through his hair to tame the curls that he hadn’t bothered gelling back this morning. He’s dressed down compared to yesterday, just a simple button-down and jeans, and yet, he still feels weirdly out of place among the uni kids that are walking around him, some of them in sweatpants, others in these hippie trouser things that Patrick thinks have to be really fucking comfortable.

“Hey,” he says when he reaches Jonny, pulse ever-too-fast. “What’s up?”

The guy who’d been standing next to Jonny laughs audibly, already walking away from the both of them, and Patrick sends him a curious look, before redirecting his attention towards Jonny. Jonny, who is sporting the gayest flannel Patrick has ever seen and jeans that cling to his thighs criminally. Patrick doesn’t bother trying to hide when he gives Jonny an appreciative once-over – especially when it turns out that Jonny does the same to him in return, grinning as he checks Patrick out.

Plus, Jonny deserves to know Patrick thinks he’s hot. He is. All tall and fit, like someone who takes care of his body, but doesn’t spend more than the necessary time at the gym either.

Patrick wonders if he can still play the straight card if it comes to it and he has to reject Jonny. Maybe Jonny forgot about Patrick, or at least the fact that he’d dated inside the team. Maybe Jonny can be convinced that all that flirting had just been Patrick being friendly. Even gay people tend to assume that the default is straight after all. A guy can hope.

“Hey,” Jonny says, smiling. His cheeks are tinted off-pink again, which Patrick decides is a good look on him. “Where do you want to go? There’s a nice coffee shop down the street if you want to.”

“Sounds good to me,” Patrick says easily. He falls into step with Jonny, steps bouncing ever-so-slightly. “It’s really strange, being back on campus. Brings back nostalgia.”

It’s a straight-up lie, because there is nothing from Pat’s time in college that he misses. He remembers failing and falling and messing up his hopes, whereas now he’s thriving. But it seems like the right thing to say in terms of small talk, which is the most important.

“Nostalgia, eh?” Jonny hums, looking left and right before crossing street. “Don't tell me you miss playing mediocre hockey with the guys and me? It's pretty much an entirely new team now. Lots of new guys came in. TJ and I are the oldest.”

Patrick laughs. “Mediocre hockey? Talk for yourself, I was _ballers_ at hockey.” Then he pauses, the name TJ ringing a bell. “Wait was that guy with you TJ? Aah, man, should have said hi. Tell him from me that he looks better without the bleaching.” He grins at Jonny. Patrick totally bleached his hair too, but that’s beside the point. He was 16, not in college. He’s learned the error of his ways since then. “And yeah, I mean, haven’t played since? Skated a bit last time we organised a hockey thing on the job, but that’s all. It was with children, it doesn’t count.”

It _had_ been fun though. Patrick hadn’t held a stick himself, but he had skated a few laps after the game was over with a few of the leftover kids who didn’t want to leave yet. This is why Sharpy calls him a softie. Pat enjoys the cover-up part of his charity too much. Even if he would be perfectly able to get rid of the children if the order was placed.

“Yeah, that was him,” Jonny confirms. “And I'll let him know.” With a grin he adds. “He's had that hair way into second year until his then girlfriend bet him he'd look shitty with his natural hair colour. You know.” He shrugs. “Thinly veiled attempt at reverse psychology. Worked though.”

The coffee shop Jonny takes them to has a bit of an alternative sort of vibe to it, and Patrick thinks that the two types of customers here are probably old people and students. At least judging from the actual people in the shop. It’s not the type of shop Patrick usually gravitates towards, but there’s a homely sort of feel to the room, and the heavy smell of coffee grains is definitely a strong point in this place’s favour.

“This is nice,” he tells Jonny when they’ve stepped inside, peeking behind the counter as he automatically catalogues all the places that someone could be hiding behind.

From the way Jonny seems to light up at the praise, it’s definitely the right thing to say. Patrick himself doesn’t have that many feelings about coffee shops – Starbucks suits him just fine – but he’s not all that against places like this either.

The only issue he has, really, is that the cosiness of the place screams “date”. Which this can’t be, as nice as that would be. At least not officially. Patrick wonders whether Jonny picked up on the fact that Patrick shot him down for “something other than coffee” at all. He knows that he could have made himself clearer if he’d wanted after all. Jonny might have just thought that Patrick was saying that they should start with coffee and go from there.

Shrugging to himself, he leads them both to the shop’s counter, where he smiles charmingly at the barista and orders himself a Mocha with extra cream. It’s too late to turn back now anyway. He’ll enjoy himself for now, and if the date issue comes up, he’ll just play dumb.

It’s fun, talking to Jonny. They get seated in a cute little booth with leather sofas, where they towards each other over the table as they sip on their coffees and Jonny inquires about Patrick’s job, curiosity having been piqued by Patrick’s off-hand comment about the hockey game.

Patrick is only too happy to answer, because it’s another occasion to make up stories and, in this case, he has reality to find inspiration from. His charity has been his main project for over six months now, since DiFronzo praised the originality of it, and he’s genuinely proud of its success. The fact that he got noticed by the mobs boss is about as well as any project could have done, despite Jason’s attempts to take credit for himself at first. After Sharpy had confirmed that Showtime had been Patrick’s idea, Patrick had been officially put in charge of it.

It’s more than a little promising for Patrick’s future inside the mob. It means that Patrick’s dream to one day replace Jason as a caporegime has chances of becoming true, down the line.

“I work at a charity,” Patrick tells Jonny, discreetly batting his lashes at him. “We help young kids do sports, by donating material to public schools and organising games. We don’t actually make the teams or anything, but we provide the facilities and do most of the planning so it’s easier for the teams. And spectators can donate money of course.” His smile turns cheeky. “It’s called Chicago Showtime and you can’t make fun of the name because I’m the one who came up with it.”

Sharpy totally made fun of him for it. And so did Felice and Shawsy. Patrick is convinced that it’s one of them that went on Showtime’s website to leave disappointed comments about it not being a theatre charity, because his friends are terrible people. (Not because they do illegal things, although he guesses that that can be argued too.) Patrick chooses to believe that Temi was the only one not to mock him because he’s an actual good person who gets where Patrick was going with the name, and not because his English wasn’t good enough.

Jonny, though, Jonny looks at Patrick like he’s hung the moon or something, and Patrick has to lift his cup so he can hide his grin against the foam for a second there, because he feels all fluttery inside all of the sudden, and because it’s also a little bit hilarious. Jonny mooning over his fake charity is misplaced admiration if Patrick has ever seen any.

“That’s amazing,” Jonny says, looking at Patrick intently, like he needs Patrick to understand just how genuine he is about the compliment. He rubs his neck, smiles at Patrick. “And I won't mock the name, I swear. But only because it's such a great thing to do, helping kids through sports. Really.”

Patrick shouldn’t find the fact that Jonny seems to care so much about charity work this hot, but it’s kind of doing it for him. Jonny doesn’t even look like he’s praising Patrick because he wants to get in his pants. It’s plain admiration. He sounds like he’s one of these genuinely good people who care about things. Gross. Patrick wants to climb him like a tree.

“Just because it’s a charity, huh?” Patrick asks, rolling his eyes playfully.

He leans in to drink again, and promptly burns his tongue on the hot mocha. He winces, puts the glass back down. Then, after about two seconds, raises it to his lips again so he can bury them in the foam.

“Well, yeah,” Jonny says.

He looks all self-satisfied, like that’s a proper chirp. It’s really lame. Then his eyes drop to Patrick’s mouth, and he stifles a laugh. It’s probably supposed to be discreet, but it’s really, really not. Patrick squints at him. He can guess what the deal is here. Quickly, he wipes at his mouth with the back of his hand, and- right. Foam. There’s foam all over his upper lip. He eyes the mocha accusingly, automatically licking the remaining foam off his lips.

When his gaze flicker back towards Jonny, Jonny’s face is the same tint of pink as before, and he looks away before Patrick can call him out on it, sipping at his coffee like it’ll save him the embarrassment. It’s really fucking cute. And kind of stirs something low in Patrick’s belly, because it could be so easy. Everything about Jonny’s body language reads like he wants to fuck Patrick, and it’s making Patrick _want_. He’s only human, and Jonny’s distractingly hot – it’s not fair to expect him to stay completely unphased by this.

Dimly, he wonders if the foam-licking really came across as that sexual, or if Jonny had already been watching his mouth before that. It’s only half-instinctive when he works his bottom lip between his teeth. He sort of wants Jonny to keep looking. Maybe Patrick will jerk off later, thinking about sucking Jonny’s dick. He bets it’s a really nice dick.

“So, do you get into bar brawls a lot, or was last night an exception?” Jonny asks. “You know, to counter balance having a job like that?”

Patrick shakes himself. Right. They’re having a conversation. His imagination has always been both his best tool to escape reality and to get his way, but in this case, it’s just going to get him an uncomfortable boner. Just because he got off to the memory of Jonny’s face once doesn’t mean he has to do it again while Jonny is still present in the room.

“Oh yeah, a good balance is important,” he tells Jonny, smiling easily. “I keep a karma check list, so that I can cancel out every good deed I do, you see? Spent some of the charity’s money on a school? Gotta go get my buddies in a fight. Men are very easy to rile up, especially when there’s women involved.” He grins, leans forward and places his chin on his hands again. “What about you? Got a fighting record on the ice?”

Not really, Jonny tells him. He’s become the uni hockey team’s captain, so he still does a lot of the yelling Patrick remembers him for, but fighting isn’t really his thing. He seems proud of the captaincy, too, which Patrick smiles at. He’s not really surprised, because as short as his time on the hockey team with Jonny had been, Jonny had seemed like the captain type back then already. Now, with this quiet assurance that he seems to be projecting, like he’s grown into his body even more – like he’s perfectly content with himself – he’s become more charismatic in a way that makes just actually want to listen to him.

Patrick bets that Jonny is fun to rile up, too, though. When Jonny offers for him to drop by hockey practice again, it’s genuinely tempting. The zing of skates against cold white ice is still a melody like no other in Patrick’s memory. The challenge of keeping a puck on his stick and skate circles around people at the same time. He’d been quick to pick up on it, yeah, but it still takes him some level of concentration to stay upright on skates to this day. He wonders if that’s something that would go away if he just tried to skate regularly again.

He tells Jonny no, though, because he’s not a student, and signing up for any sort of college activity like hockey would draw attention to him that he doesn’t want. Jonny looks genuinely disappointed at that, even if he tries to look like he doesn’t care, and it gives Patrick the crazy urge to press his foot against Jonny’s ankle in apology. Instead, he finishes his coffee, and asks Jonny about med school.

 

~~~

 

They spend maybe an hour at the coffee shop before Patrick gently guides them towards the exit. He really needs to go back to overseeing whatever the hell it is that Shawsy has been telling Elliot and Lucy, because he’s seen the project they came up with on his desk this morning, and it’s really not the sort of attention they want if they want to keep on the down-low.

They want to organise a cocktail party with important city officials and important sports equipment suppliers in Chicago, to get visibility and support. Which, sure, sounds good in theory, but is definitely a project that is too big for them right now. It would attract too much attention on them, for starters – Showtime is still fairly recent, and Patrick can’t yet be 100% sure that it’ll withstand examination by Mayor Emanuel or someone from the city hall if they have a closer look. Plus, it’s a budget that they just don’t have right now, because they don’t really _have_ a budget. Showtime is literally a charity that’s for show. They have to go easy on expenses.

Patrick confesses to Jonny that meeting up with him had only been his coffee break, which makes Jonny laugh, and he only does a small detour on the way back by taking Jonny along to the tea shop he had recommended to Patrick. Jonny swears that it’s a killer for his insomnia, and while Patrick doesn’t believe that it’ll work for him, he’s fine with indulging Jonny. Especially since Jonny is smart and going to be a kid surgeon. He probably knows things about the human body that Patrick has no idea about, whether he’s aware of Patrick’s history with substances or not.

Patrick doesn’t know how they even got to talking about their respective insomnias, but the conversation with Jonny has just been so easy and fun that he’s glad for the excuse to spend some more time with Jonny.

He also gets further confirmation that Jonny _really_ wants to bang him when Jonny does his best to hide how scandalised he is at the sight of Patrick’s Hummer, and only mutters a few aborted words about the environment, despite his body language screaming judgement and disapproval. It’s a little bit hilarious, even if Patrick can’t help but be disappointed that his car didn’t impress Jonny after all. He just had to the one guy who cares more about the environment than how cool and big his ride is. It’s one of the many tragedies of Jonny’s personality.

 

~~~

 

The next time Patrick sees him, it’s after a series of texts that span the following week, about things ranging from Patrick trying the insomnia tea and only needing to get up and piss instead of sleeping longer, to Patrick complaining about how difficult living alone is with a broken wrist, or Jonny’s hockey practice going well, or the latest Hawks games. It’s fun, texting Jonny. It gives Patrick little bursts of excitement throughout the day, things that get him to grin at his phone when he’s alone, and force down his laughs when there’s people around.

Jonny has this weird habit of spelling out his entire messages, with punctuation and everything, which Patrick decides is as good a reason as any to make fun of Jonny for.  He also sends Jonny selfies instead of emojis when he feels like making a face at his camera, and Jonny seems pretty into that, even if his answers tend to be deadpan and unimpressed. Patrick has no idea why he wasn’t friends with Jonny back in their first year of uni.

It’s when they’re both watching a Hawks game at the same time and texting about it, Patrick at a bar with Sharpy and Adam, Jonny at home with TJ, that Jonny offers for Patrick to come over to watch the next one together. Or any time Patrick is free. Smiley face. Patrick takes a sip of his beer to hide the grin on his face, because Jonny is really way too cute. It’s becoming a problem. Thankfully, Sharpy is distracted enough by the screen that he doesn’t comment, and Patrick says yes before he can think of a reason to say no.

He has a lot of those.

Like how encouraging Jonny’s crush on him is unfair to Jonny. Or how it makes Patrick himself feel all the shittier to know he could have this when he has to kiss a man twice his age, who seems convinced that calling Patrick baby girl is going to fix his wrist. Jason likes to take care of Patrick more when he pretends Patrick isn’t actually a guy. Treating him like he’s a sweet little girl is his way of coddling him. Patrick lets it happen and thinks about Jonny instead, and how he’d probably help in ways that didn’t involve sex instead of thinking that a few kisses and head pats will fix all of Patrick’s problems.

He’d probably be affectionate too, though. And fuck Patrick just right – not like Patrick is his toy to dispose of, but something he’s lucky to have.

Patrick spends a lot of time thinking about Jonny fucking him. More than meeting up with him one time and a half would probably warrant.

Those are just the easy reasons for breaking things off with Jonny before they go too far, though, the ones that Patrick can discard. It’s emotions, who cares. Even if Jonny gets a little hurt, even if Patrick does, no one is going to really suffer in the process. There are worse things that could happen, especially if Patrick gave in and let Jonny fuck him, but since Patrick isn’t going to do that, he pointedly brushes all of his good arguments off. Jason won’t consider Jonny competition until Patrick fucks him, so there’s no danger there.

Jonny sends him another smiley back at Patrick’s confirmation, and Patrick slips his phone back into his pocket with a flutter in his chest. He’s just going over to watch a sports game. Nothing is going to happen that Patrick will have to regret later.

And nothing does happen, but it’s close.

Just being in Jonny’s space feels strange, like Patrick is inside a bubble that has nothing to do with his own world. It’s a small 2-person apartment, messy in a way that indicated that Jonny must have tried to clean up before Patrick arrived but failed to give the place actual order because some things just don’t have an assigned place. There are plants decorating the living room and balcony, arranged like the centre pieces, like Jonny – they’re Jonny’s, the man himself confirms – cares more about the succulents on the living room table than anything else in the room. It feels homely and lived in and so, so unlike Trump tower, where Patrick lives.

Watching hockey with Jonny is fun, because Jonny gets super invested into the game, yelling and whooping at his screen at every play, and then catching himself with a blush whenever he remembers that Patrick is next to him. Patrick just plays along and comments on the players’ movements on the screens until Jonny relaxes enough not to care too much. He likes the way Jonny gets fired up just as much as he likes the softer side of Jonny, with the pink cheeks and futile attempts at looking casual.

As the game goes on, they move closer on the couch, until Jonny is a warm line pressed along Patrick’s side, and there really isn’t that much jumping around, then. Patrick doesn’t particularly want to move away from Jonny, and he thinks it’s the same for Jonny, who’s giving Patrick these _looks_. He’s trying to be discreet about it, lashes cast down, but he’s shit at it. Patrick pretends he doesn’t notice. He just lets himself appreciate the body contact, and the way it makes his stomach feel dumb and tingly. Something something butterflies.

When the game is over and neither of them move, Patrick stops telling himself there’s no harm done in sitting close and starts thinking a little harder about Jonny’s mouth and what it might taste like. Jonny half-heartedly offers to put on a movie, and Patrick says yes without even looking at the screen. If Jonny only turned his face towards Patrick, then Patrick could just-

He shakes himself, looks away. He’s not going to kiss Jonny. Whether he wants to or not, there’s a reason why all the reasons why he shouldn’t be in the same room as Jonny right now seem so tame. It’s because they pale next to what actually putting his mouth on Jonny’s would entail. Or his mouth on Jonny’s neck. Or on Jonny’s dick. Patrick isn’t picky, he really just wants his mouth on Jonny.

When Patrick’s phone rings, they both startle away. Patrick blinks owlishly, noticing that he’s half-hard in his jeans, but part of him is nearly relieved by the interruption. _Jason Cirone_ , his phone reads, and he gets up so Jonny can’t pick up on Jason’s side of the conversation before answering the call with a “Sorry, I gotta-“ in Jonny’s direction.

“Boss,” he says in greeting, turning his back to the couch.

He has to make sure he doesn’t say anything that’ll contradict the stories he told Jonny. The boss thing is already borderline, because he’s pretty sure he said he didn’t have a boss at Showtime. And indeed, Jonny is looking at him with a frown on his face, like he doesn’t quite get what’s happening. He probably doesn’t know a lot of people that get calls from their bosses after 10 pm.

“Patrick,” Jason says, and from the tone of his voice – short and impatient – Patrick can already tell that this is about work. He takes another step away from the couch. “I want you to come to my office. Now.”

Patrick frowns a little. This sounds like something happened that Jason really isn’t pleased by. Which means that it’s got to be an emergency, because Jason doesn’t show stress unless it’s an actual big deal. Like the last time a deal with the Irish mob went wrong, when an arms shipments getting transported through their territory had drawn police attention. Or the time three of their money-laundering restaurants had gotten raided at the same time.

Maybe it’s not quite that bad, but if Jason needs Patrick right this moment, then it must be because he needs someone to help him figure shit out. Or someone to negotiate with, although Patrick doesn’t believe that he’d get to call in associates if he really had someone else standing in his office. Much less Patrick and his broken wrist. He’s not going to be impressing any partners _or_ clients looking like he just got beat up.

“I’m on my way,” he says, already heading towards the door. “What is it?”

“It’s the Rosati deal,” Jason says. “Alvarez bailed. Be there in 20 minutes.”

Then the line gets cut. Patrick slides his phone back into his pocket, mind racing. Alvarez is their arms supplier for the Rosati deal, which is one of the biggest orders they’ve gotten in in years. It’s supposed to be the basis for their entire presence in the state of New York. Even delaying the shipment would severely impact their relationship with the Rosati family. Which means that right now, Jason wants Patrick to help him find a new supplier. Fast.

“Pat?” a voice says, and Patrick glances around to see a confused Jonny standing in the middle of his living room, looking like he doesn’t quite know if he should be worried or not.

“Sorry,” Patrick says. “It’s my boss. My second job. Not Showtime. I’ll explain next time, yeah?”

Jonny blinks. A second job works well enough for Patrick’s purposes, but it’s got to come somewhat out of nowhere for Jonny right now. Which is nothing Patrick is going to be able to help, because Jason only gave him 20 minutes, and to make that happen, he’s already going to have to crush the accelerator as it is. He gives Jonny what he knows to be a winning grin, aiming to reassure him that everything is fine.

“So I’m going to talk to you later, yeah?” He leans down to toe on his shoes, giving Jonny another fleeting glance. He doesn’t want Jonny to think that Patrick is brushing him off here just because he has to leave. “We should totally do this again.”

“I- Okay, yeah,” Jonny says.

Patrick pats his pockets to make sure he has his wallet, phone, and keys.

“Aand I’m out,” he announces cheerfully. “I’ll text you. Have a good night!”

 

~~~

 

He leaves behind a flabbergasted-looking Jonny to high-tail for his car. Chicago is darkness and colourful lights that flash by his window as he drives, but even the emptied streets aren’t enough to get him to Jason’s office earlier than the promised 20 minutes. Thankfully, though, he’s only a couple of minutes late.

“You’re two minutes late,” Jason tells him when he steps into the office, but he’s distracted, reading something on his PC screen. When he looks up, Patrick rolls his eyes at him.

“Sorry I can’t teleport,” he says good-naturedly.

They’re alone in the room, so Patrick walks right over and sits down on the edge of Jason’s desk to peer at his screen. Jason grunts in acknowledgement, a concentration line creasing the skin between his brows. On-screen, there’s Jason’s mail box open in one window, next to the excel sheet with the timeline for the Rosati arms deal, where Jason seems to have been crunching numbers.

“29th April,” Patrick reads out loud from the operations line. “Well that’s a week away, we’re never going to be able to throw up an entire new deal with an arms dealer. Our Chicago shop doesn’t produce on a scale big enough, and if Alvarez is out, we’re going to have to look abroad. Too complicated here. We’d just end up stepping on someone’s toes by accident if we go too fast in our selection. Or like, make a poor connection.”

“I agree,” Jason says. “I was thinking about getting CDG involved.”

Patrick shakes his head immediately. “CDG? Jason, they’re bigger than us, we can’t buy _more_ from them. Also, the boss won’t approve of it.”

Cartel del Golfo is a partner they’re lucky to have when it comes to drug trade, but they already have favours waiting to be claimed with them, and it’s just not safe to ask for more. It might be a last resort, sure, but getting the Chicago mob ruined because they’ve indebted themselves too much to a Mexican drug cartel is the last that they want to do. DiFronzo’s entire strategy is based around owing as little as possible and spreading out their influence by being involved with as many suppliers as they can logistically manage without creating any conflicts of interest.

“I’m your boss,” Jason says, flicking Patrick’s thigh.

“Uh huh,” Patrick says, rolling his eyes. “And _your_ boss, DiFronzo, who is also, you know, my boss, won’t validate an arms deal with CDG. That’s all I’m saying, _boss_.”

“He will if it’s last resort,” Jason insists. “Stop mouthing off. I didn’t call you here to contradict me.”

“Really?” Patrick says, raising one eyebrow. “Because I’m pretty sure Alfonso would have done a better job than me at listening and nodding. Or Alexander, or whoever.”

Any of the other soldiers that are close to Jason in line of command. Patrick’s situation is different enough for them that he doesn’t hesitate to tell Jason his mind when they’re alone – on business matters, that is – and he knows that Jason expects nothing less of him. Plus, in this case, Patrick is pretty sure that Jason just needs to bounce off his ideas and argue a little. Which Patrick can give him, easily. He swings his legs where they’re hanging off the desk.

“Sure, last resort is always a thing you can argue, but is the Rosati deal really _that_ important? We’re losing connections if it fails, yeah, but it’s _New York_. I’m from New York. Believe me, it’s far away.”

“Oh right, you are,” Jason says, giving Patrick a sharp look. “Didn’t you work for… East? The tattoo here.” He reaches close to press his thumb against Patrick’s right bicep.

“Yeah, Win East,” Patrick says, frowning. He’s not surprised that Jason remembers details of his body better than things he researched on Patrick years ago, but Win East isn’t something that’s relevant to this conversation. Like, at all. Especially since Win East was in the drugs business, not machine guns. “But it was just a street gang. And not a particularly big one. They’re small fry, you’d eat their boss for breakfast.”

Jason tuts. “I don’t eat fries for breakfast, Patrick. Only my egg-scramble and Prosciutto, you know that. And you never know when small fries might come in handy.”

“Also, I defected, so you really can’t use me there,” Patrick adds, like he didn’t hear what Jason just said.

Jason pinches his thigh this time, causing Patrick to give him an unimpressed look. Jason laughs softly.

“To get back to whether the Rosati deal is important, it’s more than just losing a connection in New York,” Jason says calmly. “The Rosati family reaches further than New York. We’ve got deals with Massachusetts right now, but if we make them choose between buying our guns and keeping up good relations with the Rosati family, then we’re losing a good buyer. Just because Chicago has background checks and gun permits doesn’t mean it can be our only selling ground.”

“We could sell abroad,” Patrick points out. “I mean, we’re already buying there.”

“That’s not the point, Patrick,” Jason says, looking like he slowly growing irritated.

With a sigh, Patrick reaches out to place his uninjured hand on his shoulder. Jason is only wearing a button down, so it’s easy to dig his thumb in the knot of muscles following the curve of Jason’s neck and kneed there. Jason gives him a look, somewhere between amused and frustrated, but his shoulders do relax, ever-so-slightly. If Patrick can drive one-handed, he can totally give baller massages too, and he knows that Jason will feel more relaxed with Patrick touching him.

“I’m just saying, let’s look into our other options, okay?” he says, more gently this time. “Where else can we get a big arms shipment? The Rosatis want, what, five dozen AK-47s and assault rifles, plus a couple rocket-launchers? Ammunition? We can try and test for a deal with one of Alvarez’ rivals, down South. Or, I don’t know. Buy from the Russians. The IRA. Romania has a pretty big arms production market, I think. Ndrangheta makes like, 1 billion in arms trafficking every year, they probably know people in Italy. Or we can buy from them directly. Honestly, our Italian trade could do better.”

Ndrangheta is an Italy-based mafia syndicate, and they have operative in the US too, so communication would be possible. They’re a potential rival, though, so it’s not going to be the easiest option. That’s the thing, really. There’s always a lot of options. What has to be done now, is looking into which ones are viable and would be open to negotiate with them on such short notice.

It takes Jason and Patrick the good part of two hours to single their list down to three candidates that they’re going to try to contact for now. Ndrangheta, the IRA, and the Thai minister of defence, Sukampol Suwannathat, whose name Patrick can’t pronounce and is apparently going to have to learn, if there’s negotiations to be made. Ndrangheta is bad enough, pronunciation-wise, but no, they have to make deals with corrupt government officials from Asia too. Patrick’s job is so hard.

When they’re done, Jason takes Patrick home, ignoring Patrick’s complaint that his car is going to spend the night at the office. Patrick guesses he should be glad that Jason is allowing him to go home to sleep at all, even if he’s fairly sure that it’s because Jason needs some time to prepare his argumentation line for each potential partner, and that he wants to do it on a rested mind. The emergency gives him an excuse to present his wife, to pretend like he spent the night at the office, too, so driving Patrick home now probably means just a little more work on Patrick’s part, and then sleeping with Jason in his bed.

Patrick lets himself be backed up against the bed when they arrive, Jason’s hand fisted in his hair as he runs his mouth alone the side of Patrick’s throat. Patrick shivers, closer to a cringe than what’s comfortable for him. Jason is familiar, but he’s wrong too. Jonny’s still too fresh on Patrick’s mind, with his sweetness and awkward charm. With Jason’s mouth finding his, Patrick just gets flashbacks to how close he’d been to tasting Jonny’s, wishing he had, just a little, so he could hold on to the memory while this was happening.

Getting back into his work mindset with the Rosati deal hasn’t been enough. As much as Patrick has sex with Jason for work reasons, it requires different levels of personal involvement from him. Work, he’s fine with. This, not so much, right now.

“You should fuck my face,” he tells Jason, letting himself fall backwards on the bed.

“Lazy slut,” Jason says, and Patrick just licks his lips with a grin, and denies nothing.

He’s having trouble getting hard right now, tiredness and instinctive distaste working together in an attempt to make this entire sex thing harder, so letting Jason straddle his chest and fuck his mouth sounds like the safest option. And, well. The one that takes the least effort. Jason is right on that one. Maybe the sensation of it will even get Patrick’s body with the program, since throat-fucking actually does sort of do it for him, if he lets himself slip into the right headspace. He’ll just have to work that little bit harder to get there, and maybe touch himself while Jason goes to town.

“Open up,” Jason orders before he feeds his cock past Patrick’s lips.

It’s familiar too, everything about this, from the weight of Jason’s legs on his shoulder to the taste of his cock, so it’s easy to just close his eyes and let his mouth do all the work. Suck on the head, lick at the spot right underneath that makes Jason curse until he starts rolling his hips forward, and all Patrick has to do is relax his throat. Even with his eyes closed, the force with which Jason fucks his throat has tears spill at the corners. By the time Jason grunts, fingers tightening in Patrick’s hair to pull his head back and open up his throat even more, Patrick’s chin is wet with spit, and his jaw is aching, but his cock is half-hard at least.

Jason comes with a satisfied groan, right down Patrick’s throat. It’s too far deep for Patrick to even taste it, which is just as well. He swallows as soon as Jason pulls out his cock, giving his sore lips a lick as he blinks up at Jason with hooded eyes. Jason cups Patrick’s jaw and smiles.

“Good fucking slut,” he says, stroking a finger across Patrick’s burning lips.

Patrick hums, tongue darting out to lick at Jason’s thumb too. “’m tired,” he says.

Jason carefully gets off Patrick’s chest, finally allowing Patrick to take a deep breath. He eyes Patrick’s crotch, before returning to his face again. Patrick doesn’t bother trying to look turned on. He could probably come if Jason wanted to give him an handie, but he’d rather not.

“You don’t want?” Jason asks.

“I’m fine,” Patrick says with a shrug. Then smiles, softly, because sex is the place he’s made Jason fall in love with him, and that remains his main objective here. He reaches out with his uninjured hand to touch Jason, just a point of contact, warm through Jason’s shirt. “Thanks, boss.”

He falls asleep with his head on Jason’s chest, because Jason seems to have taken Patrick’s cues as Patrick feeling like cuddles tonight, Jason’s hand resting against the small of his back. Three hours later, he’s awake again, rubbing his eyes and sighing silently as he rolls onto his side and tries to battle with the consciousness that’s tearing him out of the claws of sleep despite Patrick’s best attempts at clinging to them. It’s already morning before he manages to doze off again, Jason’s breath the only sound in the otherwise quiet, too-big room.

 

~~~

_[From: Jonny Taves]_

_So, what’s the second job?_

_[To: Jonny Taves]_

_Oooooh yeah_

_sry abt that_

_the other night_

_didn’t mean to leave u hanging like tht :((((_

_[From: Jonny Taves]_

_It’s okay._

_[To: Jonny Taves]_

_Let me mke it up to u?_

_[From: Jonny Taves]_

_You really don’t have to._

_[To: Jonny Taves]_

_No rly_

_[From: Jonny Taves]_

_I was just asking about the job :)_

_[To: Jonny Taves]_

_I’ll tke u out nxt time_

_Coffee or w/e_

_Oh_

_sry_

_It’s a security job_

_Charity dsn’t exactly earn u the big bucks so I’ve got a 2n job_

_Its not a regular thng_

_So im employed at this agency who hires ppl for security gigs occasionally, yeah? & theres no fixed times or anythg, but they do give us notice earlier usually_

_Yday was jst someone calling in sick last minute, & my boss needed someone else quick_

_[From: Jonny Taves]_

_Is the security job for your karma check list?_

_[To: Jonny Taves]_

_XDDDD_

_u got me_

_gotta cancel out the good thgs by shooting ppl_

_(mostly keeping them from being shot tho)_

_[From: Jonny Taves]_

_I don’t think that counts as subtracting good karma. You’re bad at maths._

_[To: Jonny Taves]_

_I have NEVER been more insultd in my ENTIRE life_

_take it back_

_[From: Jonny Taves]_

_No._

_[To: Jonny Taves]_

_Offer cancelled, Im not taking u out anywhere_

_[From: Jonny Taves]_

_:(_

_[To: Jonny Taves]_

_BUT I did spot a sweeeet console @ urs yday so may b ill come over for some games_

_Nv owned videogames_

_[From: Jonny Taves]_

_You’re welcome any time._

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter warnings:**  
>  \- Explicit sex: Pat has sex with someone who isn't Jonny (again)  
> \- Illegal activity: just normal mob stuff, as you do, organising arms deals, money laundering, all that. Regulations surrounding charities in the US are taken very liberally.


	3. Chapter 3

It’s objectively not a good idea to see Jonny again, is the thing. Sure, they’ve avoided disaster once, but Patrick can’t seem to stop flirting at Jonny for the love of himself, and it’s making things pop up in his head that should really remain in the realm of fantasies, where they belong. Sexual fantasies should be just that, fantasies, when their fulfilment might lose you your job and potentially threaten your and another person’s lives. Imagining things is fine. Even texting is fine.

What’s not fine, is that Patrick shows up at Jonny’s apartment barely half a week after nearly kissing him, in the middle of the afternoon, two coffees in hand because he did sort of promise Jonny to buy him one. There’s a latte for himself, and soy milk for Jonny, in case he ordered it that way because of an allergy last time. Patrick hadn’t asked, because he doesn’t pry for that sort of information as a general rule – too many things about his own diet and habits that he doesn’t want to explain – and when Jonny’s face lights up at the sight of the soy box being ticked off, he guesses that he’s scored yet another point.

It’s really fucking easy to score points with Jonny, Patrick gets the feeling, actually. He’s good at getting people to like him, but in this case, it’s natural, like he barely has to make any efforts. Remembering one thing here, a sneaky word of praise there, and Jonny’s already glowing on the inside, trying and failing to hide what he thinks under that terrible poker face of his. Patrick doesn’t even have to dress up to get Jonny to look at him like he’s flown right down from heaven.

“Soy. You remembered,” Jonny says happily, and Patrick nods with a small smile.

Jonny looks good, as always. Comfortable and wearing yet another flannel, like he’s trying to send Patrick the hugest signals about his sexuality. It makes Patrick want to roll his eyes and laugh and kiss Jonny. He’s received the invitation loud and clear. Multiple times. So much so that he’s going to have to answer it eventually.

Between Alvarez cancelling the shipment for the Rosati deal because of bankruptcy, something that Patrick suspects is code for “has been fucking had by either a partner or a mistress”, and trying to find a replacement dealer – Thailand is out, but they’re in contact with both Ireland and Italy – Patrick hasn’t really set foot outside his office since the last time he was at Jonny’s place. Even Showtime has had to take a backseat in priorities.

Maybe it’s the reason why he still hasn’t talked himself out of coming here, but between calling the IRA and comparing American and Irish rocket-launchers, he’s also come up with an excuse he can give _Jonny_ to slow things down.

“’course I did,” he says, in the same breath as, “By the way, I’m straight. Dating a girl and everything.”

He smiles at Jonny, who freezes, right where they’re standing, in the middle of his hallway. Patrick takes a sip from his coffee. Maybe it’s too late for him to sell to Jonny that he’s straight, but pretending that he’s repressed enough that he won’t act on it? He can do that. Especially since the girlfriend card should get Jonny to back off.

“You’re… straight,” Jonny echoes. “But what about- But you- What about Tyler?”

He’s stammering like he’s been thrown completely out of the loop here, which Patrick gets. He’s been giving off some pretty mixed signals here.

The part that Patrick _doesn’t_ get as much, is why Jonny had to bring up Ty. He falters, just for a second, before quickly smoothing his face into something carefully blank.

“Ty was… a mistake.” Just like a lot of choices that Patrick made when he was 17, when he was 18. He’d sort of hoped that Jonny would have forgotten about two of his teammates from five years ago dating, given how short it had been, as foolish as that might sound. Then a thought strikes him, and he blinks. “Wait, you were on the team with Ty for longer than I stayed, weren’t you. Did he-“ _miss me? Hate me? How long did I make him miserable for? Did he move on?_

Patrick cuts himself off, quickly lifting his coffee to his lips to keep himself from blurting out anything more embarrassing. He doesn’t care. Doesn’t care about any of these answers. He locked away his feelings for Ty and threw the key away years ago, and it doesn’t _matter_ if Ty managed to get back on his feet after Patrick dumped him. He couldn’t have cared about Patrick enough for that not to be the case anyway, and what does the time it took for Ty to move on change about how things played out?

It doesn’t matter. Patrick doesn’t care. He pushes everything down, down, down, and then he’s smiling at Jonny again, like nothing happened at all.

“Ty is a thing that happened, yeah, but it’s just… not a thing anymore. And I have a girlfriend. That’s the relevant information here. So, you wanna teach me how to play Mario Cart?”

He leaves a rumpled-looking Jonny behind and stalks off towards the living room like they weren’t having an important conversation at all. He’s considered whether Jonny would kick him out of his apartment after Patrick rejected him, but Jonny doesn’t seem like the type of guy to do that, and video games sound like the perfect way to defuse the situation. Patrick wants to keep Jonny’s friendship after all.

Well, he wants the rest too, but those parts he can’t have, so salvaging the friendship aspects is really just Patrick clinging to whatever bone he throws himself. It’s weird, defining your own limits, sometimes.

When he’s reached the living room, he flops down on the sofa, grinning back at Jonny over the edge of it. Jonny gives him an irritated sort of scowl. He seems to hesitate, then, just for a second, before following Patrick into the living room. His gaze is thoughtful when he sits down next to Patrick, every muscle in his body controlled. It’s too obvious, if Jonny were trying to fool someone into thinking he had full control of the situation, but it’s not bad either. He looks at Patrick intently.

“You know, having a girlfriend doesn’t stop you from being gay,” Jonny says. “I’ve had sex with lots of guys who had girlfriends. Who said a mouth is a mouth or a hand is a hand, or who were only gay counting three tequilas and up.” He shrugs. “I’ve had sex with guys who called it a mistake afterwards, and they still came back for more.”

Patrick’s mouth dries faster than he can blink. All the cards are on the table now, both his and Jonny’s. Except that what Jonny is saying has an appeal that Patrick’s lies don’t. God, Jonny talking about guys he’s fucked in that dispassionate monotone of his shouldn’t be as hot as it is, but it still gets Patrick’s mind spinning, imagining a line of straight guys, all getting their minds blown. Jonny’s hand, Jonny’s _mouth_ \- Patrick’s eyes flicker down to the sharp line of Jonny’s cupid’s bow.

It makes Patrick’s skin tingle, his stomach churn in anticipation. It makes him want to grab Jonny’s collar and pull him in, smash their mouths together, run his hands through Jonny’s hair and taste his skin until he has him squirming.

Instead, he plasters on a grin, leaning towards Jonny ever-so-slightly. “Why, cause you’re that good?”

It’s dumb. It’s not what Patrick should be doing right now. But Patrick wants to see if he can push the button a little further. How far he can go before it becomes too much.

“Maybe,” Jonny says, giving half a shrug. “Or maybe it’s just that giving in to what you want can be addictive.”

Patrick stares, wondering if Jonny’s choice of word is supposed to be some sort of warning sign from heaven that he needs to say no. That this isn’t okay. Just the mention of addiction makes something low in Patrick’s gut ache, in a way that he knows won’t ever go away. He shivers, smile slipping from his face, eyes flickering back to Jonny’s mouth for a split-second.

“Are you asking if I know my way around dick?” Jonny barrels on, unaware of how much his words have been impacting Patrick. “Because yeah, I do. I can prove it to you if you want to.”

Patrick lets out a shaky sort of breath. Closes his eyes for a moment. He’d accounted for Jonny being potentially hurt by Patrick’s rejection, but not for him to offer to fuck this explicitly. Maybe it had been a misjudgement on his part, and really, it doesn’t even matter anymore, what he thought beforehand – but he does regret not being prepared for this. If he had, then maybe it wouldn’t affect him this much. Patrick has always struggled with resisting temptation, after all, and Jonny is temptation incarnate.

“Look, Jonny,” he says, more softly this time. “I’m in a relationship. I don’t need you to prove anything to me.”

“Okay,” Jonny says. He nods to himself. Then he gets up. “Give me a minute, will you?”

He’s out of the room before Patrick has the chance to answer anything back, and Patrick watches him walk off with a sigh, dissatisfaction heavy in his chest. Part of him is disappointed that Jonny didn’t push any further, just accepted Patrick’s answer and walked out. Because as chivalrous as that is, it’s not what Patrick _wants_.

It’s as Jonny said, though. It’s addictive to give in to the things that you want, and Patrick has become an expert at denying himself things. If he can manage to ghost his own sisters for years without breaking, then he can stay sitting on this couch and play video games with Jonny without pinning Jonny against the nearest surface and demand that he prove just why no one can resist him. Patrick feels honestly sorry for all of the girls whose boyfriends got seduced by Jonny.

Not so much for Jason, who doesn’t deserve Patrick’s fidelity as much as he enforces it. Which is all the difference here.

When Jonny comes back, barely over five minutes later, he’s got two bottles in hand. He stops before the couch to hand Patrick one.

“Root beer?”

Patrick nods minutely. The bottle is icy cold against the palm of his hand, and he offers Jonny a careful smile. He doesn’t quite know what to do about the tension in the room.

“Thanks,” he says, while Jonny sits down on the couch under Patrick’s watchful eyes. Patrick clears his throat. “Are we good?”

“Of course we are, buddy,” Jonny says, giving Patrick a smile and clinking their bottles together before taking a sip. “I’ve had a crush on TJ and now he’s my best friend. Rejection isn’t the worst thing in the world.”

Patrick wouldn’t really know, but he’s mostly relieved. Jonny has to be really fucking resilient if he can be roommates with a guy he used to have a crush on, especially since he’s mentioned how the walls between their rooms here are thin enough that he has to listen to TJ and his girlfriend fuck sometimes. And while Jonny doesn’t look happy about the rejection, he does seem sincere. Maybe Patrick really is going to be lucky enough that they can get over this.

“I guess not,” he says, following Jonny’s example by taking a sip of his root beer. It’s a lot of caffeine for one afternoon, but that’s nothing unusual for Patrick.

“Now, are you ready to get your ass kicked at Mario Kart,” Jonny says, nudging Patrick’s shoulder, “because I’m not gonna go easy on you, just because you’re a newbie.”

Patrick lets out a laugh. “Uhm, excuse me, I think the one whose ass is about to be kicked is not me.”

Jonny just snorts at him, before getting up to start up the console. He has to bend down for it, taking the CD out of its case and inserting it. It’s not on purpose, Patrick doesn’t think, but it still ends up giving Patrick an eyeful of Jonny’s ass, stretching the dumb shorts that he’s wearing. It’s round and big and fucking perfect. Patrick’s mouth goes a little dry at the sight. Again. Jonny’s ass is something else. Like, a weapon of mass destruction. Made do disprove every theory about Patrick’s supposed straightness.

Jonny turns back around before Patrick can get himself back together, and Patrick’s face grows hot when he catches Jonny’s considering gaze. Then Jonny smirks, like he wants to say “I told you so,” and it tragically does nothing to diminish Patrick’s attraction to him. He’s got it bad. Even after Jonny sits back down, sparing Patrick the embarrassment of a comment, all Patrick can think is that he wouldn’t mind Jonny sitting on him instead. Maybe his face. He’s never eaten a guy out, but he knows how it works, and he can definitely imagine it with Jonny.

“So,” Patrick says, grabbing one of the controllers. He really need to cut this shit down. “Who’re you gonna pick?”

“Not telling you or you’ll steal him from me,” Jonny says, before promptly selecting Luigi.

“Lame. Nobody wants to play a weird Mario knockoff with a moustache.”

“You’re the one who’s lame,” Jonny says intelligently.

“At least I don’t have a moustache,” Patrick answers, grinning despite himself.

It’s just some dumb banter – and not even particularly smart one at that – but it feels more like normal conversation than anything they’ve had up to this moment, and it’s more of a relief than Patrick wants to admit, as conscious as his attempt to keep Jonny’s friendship had been. He doesn’t lean against Jonny’s shoulder, but it’s a near thing.

Patrick is bad at video games, it turns out. He used to play with Kev, back in Buffalo, and when he was even younger, he’d had one friend at school who had a console and sometimes let him and Tara play for a while, but all of that is a long time back. Having played GTA at 15 doesn’t do much for his current skill at Mario Cart. He tries to apply himself, though, and the system is instinctive enough that he gets the controls and objectives down quickly enough. It takes up enough of his attention to make him stop overthinking things too, and soon, they’re both yelling at the screen and each other.

If Patrick thought that Jonny got into it when they were watching hockey, video games are another level altogether. He gets competitive in a way that reminds Patrick of the Jonny he’d known back in college – the one that had screamed at him more than they had talked. It’s hilarious, especially given that Patrick is so obviously worse than Jonny – any time Patrick gets ahead of Jonny, and even the one time he wins over Jonny because Jonny gets blue-shelled seconds before arrival, Jonny gets looks more aggravated than a college kid who Patrick just told the prices for a bag of heroin.

“Wow, and here I thought you were gonna “kick my ass”,” Patrick taunts, doing airquotes.

“You didn’t even win,” Jonny says indignantly. “The AI beat you.”

“Still better than you. Look, I’m 3rd place, and you’re 6th. Honestly, I think you’re just bad.”

Jonny gives him an incensed look. It’s like he doesn’t even see that Patrick is messing with him. Patrick has to bite the inside of his cheek to keep his smile provocative instead of bursting into laughter.

“Okay then,” Jonny says, staring Patrick down. “You and me. Race. No AI.”

Patrick pretends to think about it for a second. “Only if you give me your controller.”

“No,” Jonny says, immediately pulling the controller closer to his chest. “Why?”

“Because you might be cheating,” Patrick says, grinning. “I’ve been losing all this time, I bet you just lost to fool me into believing you’re good. But you’re actually not.” He wiggles his eyebrows at a Jonny who looks like he doesn’t know if he should be scandalised or laugh. “So. Give me your controller. And I’ll make sure that you’re not a dirty cheater.”

“It’s _mine_ , though,” Jonny says.

“As is the one I’m holding here,” Patrick says, dangling his own controller.

Jonny squints his eyes at him. “No.”

“No?”

“Fuck off, Pat.”

Patrick watches Jonny for a second, watches how Jonny watches him back. Then he makes a dive for the controller. Jonny yelps and tumbles back, grip tightening around it, so Patrick improvises around the whole brace situation by ramming his left forearm against Jonny’s clavicle to shove him back, right hand twisting between Jonny’s fingers to try and grab the controller.

“Pat, you-“ Jonny gasps, outraged, but he promptly yanks the controller away and up, as high as his arm will reach, making use of the length he has on Patrick.

“You fucker,” Patrick laughs.

This time, he actually shoves Jonny over and gets a knee across his sternum to block him flat on the couch before Jonny can do more than flail his arms. Patrick knows how to pin someone, even with a broken wrist. He’s been in actual fights, which definitely isn’t Jonny’s case, who doesn’t recognise that he’s not going to get out of the position he’s in until Patrick’s straddling his chest and leaning forward to grab the controller out of his still outstretched hand.

Patrick has to pry his fingers open with some difficulty – time during which he’s pretty much smothering Jonny’s face with his stomach – but when he does, using his left elbow to give Jonny’s forearms a short jab, he sits up with a victorious cheer.

“Suck it, you can’t beat me,” he croons, holding the controller up.

He’s got one knee under Jonny’s armpit, and the other over Jonny’s shoulder, and for a second he wonders if that the reason that Jonny is breathing as hard as he is. Maybe Patrick is crushing his chest with his weight. Then he notices the haziness in Jonny’s eyes, the flush on his cheeks that is in no way all exertion, and his stomach does a flip.

“Yeah,” Jonny pants. For a split-second, his eyes flicker to Patrick’s crotch before settling on a spot on the ceiling instead. “You win.”

“I-“ Patrick starts, and then breaks off, because he feels Jonny move his arm to do _something_ under him, like he’s adjusting himself – touching himself – and Jonny’s eyes are so fucking dark, and his mouth is _right there_ \- “Uhm.”

Patrick swallows dryly, a couple of times, drops the hand that’s holding the controller, pressing it against his thigh instead. He’s hard, there’s no doubt in that, which Jonny must have noticed. More importantly, he’s sitting on top of Jonny, has Jonny’s face right between his legs, and it’s all a little too much. Especially when Jonny’s eyes find him again, dark and silent, like Jonny is just waiting for Patrick to call the shots.

 _Addictive_ , a part of his brain reminds him.

 _Jason is going to strangle you_ , another adds.

Patrick stares at Jonny’s mouth. Thinks about how easily he could just push his cock past those pretty lips, let Jonny lick it nicely, and-

“Do you not want… to get off?” Jonny asks.

Patrick shakes his head slowly. “Yeah.”

His voice is quiet, and he knows he needs to get off of Jonny, literally, ignoring any second meaning there. But it’s like he’s glued in time and space, like he can’t get out of this moment, because no part of him wants to.

Slowly, like it’s moving on its own, his uninjured hand reaches out to cup Jonny’s jaw, presses his thumb against the side of Jonny’s bottom lip, ever-so-slightly. It yields under Patrick’s finger, soft and warm. Patrick can feel the air that passes over his thumb at Jonny’s sharp exhale.

Then Jonny’s mouth falls open, easy as that. Patrick’s finger slips inside, where it’s wet and hot, and Jonny’s tongue feels like velvet. Everything seems to crystallise in that moment, from Patrick’s own irregular breaths, to the soft weight of Jonny’s tongue, and then the way Jonny’s lips close around his finger to _suck_. Patrick can barely breathe, barely imagine putting his cock there, because how could it not be too much when Patrick already feels on the edge of passing out from just one finger?

He pulls his finger back, dragging down against the corner of Jonny’s mouth to leave a wet trail there, eyes following the shine in the afternoon light. It’s easier than looking into Jonny’s eyes, that are too dark and intense, too full of expectations.

It takes all of Patrick’s self-control not to jump when Jonny clears his throat.

“I could, you know?”

Patrick blinks owlishly. “What?”

“Suck it,” Jonny says, and this time it’s a smirk that tugs at the corner of Jonny’s stupid, perfect mouth.

Patrick makes a sound at the back of his throat, like a sob, or like a groan of pure want. He can’t. He can’t say no out of his own strength, needs something to save him like last time, like Jason calling him in for work again. It’s too hard, and doesn’t know what to do with himself when all he wants is to give in. He fucking hates how weak he is.

He’s got to get his dick in there, he just needs- He needs Jonny. He’d be fine with anything that involved touching more of Jonny, really, but if Jonny wants to suck his dick, then Patrick can’t refuse. It’s too tempting, he wants this too bad.

“Yeah?”

With febrile hands, he works his fly open, cursing at how the brace renders the fingers of his left hand inflexible. Even the pressure of his hands against his fly is both too much and not nearly enough for how painfully hard Patrick is. He shifts on Jonny’s chest, gets both legs over Jonny’s shoulders so his weight is distributed more evenly.

“Is this okay?” he asks. “I’m not too heavy, you’re- You want this?”

“Fuck yeah I want this,” Jonny says without a second of hesitation, enough that Patrick doesn’t have any qualms left about just pushing his boxers down and pulling his cock out so he can bring it to Jonny’s lips.

Jonny’s tongue darts out immediately to lap at the head of Patrick’s cock, causing a shock to run through the entirety of Patrick’s body, up to his toes. He doesn’t make a sound again, but he has to be flushed all the way down to his navel by now, face taunt with concentration. Jonny does it again, makes Patrick’s toes curls, and Patrick lets out a shaky breath, fingers tightening around the base of his cock.

It’s slow-going, when he feeds it into Jonny’s mouth, despite Jonny’s attempts at getting him in faster by tilting his head off the couch, and every inch of it is heaven. Patrick hasn’t had his dick sucked since Ty. Patrick hasn’t been _touched_ in a way that felt so incrementally good and right since Ty. For someone who has been in Jonny’s exact position just half a week ago, a cock down his throat, Patrick feels decidedly out of his depth – like he’s new at this, even.

Which isn’t to say that he just starts fucking Jonny’s mouth without a care for Jonny’s levels of comfort. He goes as far as he can without choking Jonny, and then he stops, fingers loosely jacking the base of his cock while Jonny shows him exactly why all of the straight guys he claims to have fucked always come back. Patrick’s fingers bump against Jonny’s lips every time Jonny comes back up, sucking tight around the head, tongue working right underneath, where it’s sensitive, until Patrick wants to shout.

The jolts of sensation make way to crushing wetness when Jonny goes for more, deeper, and just the visuals of it are enough to make Patrick feel like he could come his brains out. He slides forward to make it easier on Jonny’s neck at least, if he’s going to deep-throat him for real here. It’s mesmerising. Jonny’s mouth looks perfect, spread around his shaft like this, and there’s a crease of concentration in Jonny’s brown that, mixed together with the slight daze of arousal, makes his face look like both the dumbest and the hottest thing Patrick has ever seen in his life.

“You’re killing me,” he breathes, low and ragged. “You’re so fucking good, Jonny, so beautiful like this, I don’t know how- Oh _fuck_.”

Jonny does something with his tongue that short-circuits Patrick’s brain, and then swallows around his cock. Patrick can feel Jonny’s throat constricting around him, only to be followed by one of Jonny’s hands grabbing his ass and pushing, like he wants Patrick to go ahead and actually use his hips. It’s what this position is made for, Patrick knows that, but he still hesitates for a second before giving a shallow thrust forward.

Jonny moans approvingly, sound reverberating inside his mouth in a way that has Patrick’s toes curl for the billionth time, so Patrick does it again, rocking in and out, until the sensations get so overwhelming that he _has_ to pull out. Jonny makes a noise of protest, staring up at Patrick like he doesn’t understand, but Patrick just shakes his head desperately, hand finding its way back to his cock. He needs to come so fucking bad, can’t do it with his cock still down Jonny’s throat if he doesn’t want to force Jonny to swallow.

“I can-“ Jonny’s already starting.

Patrick doesn’t make it until the end of the sentence, the sound of Jonny’s fucked up voice from taking Patrick’s cock doing it for him just as much as the visuals, or the touch of his own hand around his aching cock. He comes with a low, punched-out moan, streaks of white painting Jonny’s chin and mouth while Patrick fists his cock, hard, until he’s done, shaky and buzzing inside from the power of his orgasm.

Jonny’s tongue darts out again, licking away some of the come that landed near his mouth, and Patrick can’t help the whine that escapes his lips.

“Fuck, Jonny.”

He climbs off Jonny’s shoulders, down his body on the couch, and then his mouth is on Jonny’s, smearing some of his own come onto his face. Patrick refuses to care about that, or even about Jonny sucking his cock before kissing him for the first time, because Jonny’s lips are hot and perfect, and Jonny kisses him back with a groan that has everything in Patrick shake. He tangles his right hand into Jonny’s hair, pulls him closer. Jonny meets him with as much passion as Patrick puts into it, tongue tasting of Patrick’s come.

He’s hard too, a hot length against Patrick’s thigh. From the way he gives small, aborted thrusts forward, Patrick guesses that he would be more than okay with rubbing off against Patrick like that, but Patrick wants more than that. He hasn’t fantasised about sucking Jonny’s dick for weeks to pass up on the occasion to actually do so.

Patrick presses his hand flat against Jonny’s shoulder to keep him on the couch and lifts himself up, ever-so-slightly. Jonny is beautiful, the way he stares up at Patrick with his mouth slightly agape and his pupils shot wide. Patrick has to lean down to mouthe at his jawline, just because. The moan Jonny makes is all the encouragement needed for him to keep going, clean up Jonny’s face of the leftover come on it, licking and nibbling until all Jonny’s skin is wet with is spit.

“ _Pat_ -“ Jonny groans.

Patrick lifts off again to grin down at Jonny. “I’m going to suck you off now.”

Parts of his brain are back online, enough that there’s alarm bells trying to get through to him, but Patrick pushes it all down. The post-orgasm haze, the way Jonny looks, turned on and needy, _that’s_ what Patrick wants to focus on right now.

Jonny makes a noise that is in no way a word.

Patrick laughs. He’s still buzzing from his own orgasm, and every touch is intoxicating. Jonny is big and everywhere for Patrick to touch and indulge in. There’s no urgency left in him, none approaching what Jonny must be feeling, but he still wants to get his mouth on Jonny, wants to get Jonny off as hard as he’d done for Patrick. So he crawls down Jonny’s body, lifts Jonny’s shirt up so he can kiss his stomach while he undoes Jonny’s fly painstakingly. It’s definitely harder to do on someone else than on yourself one-handed, but Patrick is resourceful.

Jonny lifts his hips helpfully when Patrick pulls down his boxers and shorts, and Patrick proceeds to take them off entirely so he can kneel between Jonny’s legs without getting obstructed by any fabric. It leaves Jonny with only the shirt on, bunched up around his middle, and the flannel, spread out against the couch. Patrick has to smirk silently at the sight. There’s a scar peaking out from under Jonny’s shirt, coming down to above his navel, that Patrick gives a fleeting glance but doesn’t ask about. He’s got better things to do. Like get his mouth on Jonny’s dick.

“Fuck,” Jonny says.

Patrick smiles, bobs his head forward until he’s got most of Jonny in his mouth and his hand is covering the rest. It’s like a rush, making Patrick want to go for more, hard, right away. He shouldn’t, probably. Just because he fucked up by letting Jonny suck his dick doesn’t mean that he can just go for it and blow his cover entirely by showing exactly how much experience he has with deep-throating. There’s a fine line here that Patrick has to thread in order to salvage his story, between revealing too much and giving a bad blowjob.

Of course, giving a bad blowjob is out of question, not least because his competitive side wants to one-up Jonny. Losing at video games at a game Patrick has never tried before is one thing, but dicks? Jonny’s not the only one who knows his way around them, thank you very much.

It’s easy, with Jonny already as worked up as he is, to just wrap his tongue around Jonny’s cock and suck, bob his head up and down fast and hard. It’s not quite finesse, but Patrick feels Jonny’s thighs flex on either side of him when Jonny has to keep himself from thrusting up into Patrick’s mouth, which is a clear enough sign of Patrick doing a good job. Then Jonny’s hand finds Patrick’s hair, threading up against his scalp, causing Patrick to shiver.

“Pat-“ Jonny starts, not quite tightening his fingers into Patrick’s hair, just resting them there, like he doesn’t know if he’s allowed. “Can I?”

Patrick pulls off with a pop to mouthe at Jonny’s balls for a second before answering. Jonny’s entire body shakes from it. It’s awesome.

“Go to town,” he encourages, smiling before taking the glistening head of Jonny’s cock between his lips again.

It’s strange, really, how much of a gentleman Jonny is with these things, doing things like asking for permission to pull on Patrick’s hair, or even before that, how easily he’d accepted Patrick’s no. It’s probably just how normal people are supposed to act, but it still makes Patrick’s chest feel all weird and tight. He’s used to more negotiating, when it’s not straight-up being told what to do. The fact that Jonny doesn’t correspond to those expectations- It just makes Patrick want to try harder to make him feel good in return.

So he goes harder, applies himself by keeping his lips tight, teeth covered, and tongue flexible. The hand he’d been using to jack the base of Jonny’s cock slips lower, pressing against the spot right above Jonny’s balls. Patrick hums, pleased, when Jonny gives a full-body jerk at that. Jonny’s fingers tighten in his curls, tugging like he wants to pull, but doesn’t have it in him to put force into anything that could get Patrick away from his dick.

Soon, Patrick can feel Jonny’s balls tighten under his fingers, Jonny’s hips stuttering, and he goes down, down, down on Jonny’s cock so he can get his come as deep as he can. Not past his throat, because he wants to taste, but definitely not far off.

The taste of Jonny’s come is salty on his tongue, tangy in a way that’s slightly different from Patrick’s own. It’s not the taste that’s the best about it, though; more like the thought of it, the knowledge of swallowing down Jonny’s come, and the way that Jonny’s looking down at him like he’s hung up the moon. Patrick licks his lips and smiles.

“Fuck, Pat,” Jonny says, carding his fingers through Patrick’s hair gently.

Patrick indulges in the touch for a moment, closing his eyes. Then he sits up so that he’s kneeling between Jonny’s open legs, and stretches. He feels… good. Just good. From the sex, the touching, and Jonny himself, who still looks a little drugged. He wants to kiss Jonny, too, just lie back down and make out, but he refrains from it, instead offering Jonny a silly sort of smile and bumping his fist softly against Jonny’s naked thigh.

“Good run. Five stars.”

Jonny lets out a startled laugh, propping himself up on his elbows. “Oh my god,” he says, shaking his head. “You are ridiculous.”

“You’re into it,” Patrick says confidently, because, well, it’s not like Jonny can deny it at this point.

Jonny shrugs, and doesn’t deny anything. “So this was nice, eh?” he asks, smiling. “I mean, TJ is gonna kill me for doing this on our couch, but…”

Something inside Patrick freezes. It’s like a pop, like the toothpick that burst the bubble Patrick was allowing himself to remain in for just a moment longer. It’s not just them anymore - there’s Jonny’s roommate, TJ. There’s Jason.

There’s consequences.

Patrick stares down into his lap. He breathes in, out, quickly gathering himself back together. His hands automatically move to his crotch, tucking himself back into his pants and zipping everything back into place. It’s a blessing, really, that Patrick is so used to playing a part, that he was aware enough even during the sex not to fuck up his script completely. He has his walls back up in no time, glancing towards Jonny as Patrick works his lip nervously, but not _too_ nervously. At least Patrick planned ahead by assuming he wouldn’t be able to sell a 100% straight story, so his back story still works.

“So, uhm, you know, the girlfriend thing?” he says faux-casually. It’s enough for Jonny’s face to shutter closed in response. “I was kind of hoping we could not tell people we had sex. Cause that’d be kinda bad for me.”

The thing is, Jason has ways of finding things out. He won’t be looking for this, sure, but it should stay between as little people as possible, just in case he does. There’s no way Patrick can let anyone who knows him know of what happened with Jonny, and even TJ knowing is already the start of a possible chain of information. One that could cost Patrick a lot more than he can afford to lose, and get even Jonny in trouble. Patrick feels sick, guilt pooling in his stomach. Jonny has no idea what he signed up for, here.

“Who would I even tell?” Jonny asks. “I mean, yeah, TJ, but, he’s my best friend and he’s not gonna tell anyone else. And I’m not- I mean, do you walk around and tell everyone who you sleep with? I don’t even know anyone who’d know who you are who I’m friends with.” He gives a small shrug, looking genuinely _insulted_ by Patrick’s request. Patrick sighs internally at how sweet and naïve that reaction is. “So. It’s fine? You and your girlfriend, that’s your business.”

He sits up, and Patrick has to shift away a little to let him get his legs off the couch. When Jonny starts looking for his boxers and shorts, Patrick silently hands them to him. He regrets the warmth of before, the way everything had felt good and easy, but it is what it is.

The thing is, Patrick _doesn’t_ know if TJ will be keeping quiet about this. Maybe TJ won’t go about yelling about them on the street, but maybe he’ll drop in a conversation that Jonny got laid recently, that it was with a guy that used to play hockey with them. Maybe Jonny will mention that he’s had game recently, and someone who knows what they’re looking for will find the information they want in even that little.

Jonny turns away from him as he pulls his boxers back up. It reminds Patrick of Ty. Patrick wonders if that’s going to be a theme in his life, sleeping with people and then making them so uncomfortable in the aftermath that they’ll have to move away from him. Close themselves off.

“I’m sorry,” he tells Jonny tightly. “I shouldn’t have done that, okay?” He runs a hand through his hair and sighs. Then he looks at the tense lines in Jonny’s back, leans forward to kiss Jonny’s shoulder anyway. “I’m sorry I’m an asshole. This was good, yeah? Really good.”

“Yeah, it was good,” Jonny says, turning back to face Patrick after exhaling slowly. “It was really fucking great and you absolutely should have done it and I’m so glad you did.” He pauses, gaze challenging. “I want you to do it again.”

He looks like he wants to say more, but Patrick shakes his head. “No, Jonny,” he cuts him off. “It can’t happen again, okay? This was a-“ he swallows, looks away from Jonny, “mistake. Can you just please, please promise me that you won’t tell anyone?”

The disappointment and hurt in Jonny’s face are like a punch to Patrick’s gut, but he pushes that down with everything else. That’s all there is to do with feeling, all that ever has been. Instead, he makes sure to look sincere and pleading, hoping that Jonny cares enough about him to agree to that much at least. He probably doesn’t deserve the gesture, but it’s more important than that, isn’t about Patrick’s feelings on the matter at all. Jonny just doesn’t know.

“TJ already thinks we’re fucking, though,” Jonny points out. “When I asked him to be busy today he told me to use protection. I didn’t know you had a girlfriend then, I didn’t know us hooking up would get you into trouble, I just-”

He cuts himself off, rubbing his neck, and Patrick feels a pang of want. It would be so easy to grab Jonny’s chin and slot their mouths together again. The room they’re sitting in feels too cold right now, and Jonny is too far away, and too close at the same time. Patrick needs to leave. Fuck, Patrick probably needs to cut this out entirely and stop talking to Jonny entirely, since he clearly has no self-control. And if he’s going to have to do that-

Patrick breathes out a sigh and leans forward to kiss Jonny. Just as a reminder of how soft and sweet Jonny’s mouth is. Jonny blinks at him, lips parting like he wants more when Patrick pulls back again.

“Tell him not to tell anyone, then,” Patrick says. He gets up, and Jonny follows the movement.

“Okay,” Jonny says. “I’ll tell him. Not even to Lauren.”

He reaches forward like he wants to take Patrick’s hand, but Patrick lifts his hand instead to run it through his hair. The line in Jonny’s jaw hardens. Patrick wonders how many openings he’s going to give Patrick until he’s tired of being rejected. A selfish part of Patrick hopes he never stops.

“For what it's worth, I had a good time today,” Jonny says once they’re standing in the hallway again, with Patrick’s hand on the doorknob. “And you have my number, so.”

One more opening, then.

“I do,” Patrick says softly. “Have a good night, Jonny.”

 

~~~

 

Patrick goes home, and calls Jason.

It doesn’t take much convincing to get Jason to come over to Trump tower, and even less for him to fuck Patrick into the mattress until Patrick has stopped cringing and feels a little less happy, a little more like himself. Like he’s supposed to be. Someone with no time or desire for romance, who’s dedicating himself to his job by any means necessary.

The flowers on his tattoo sleeve feel like they’re taunting him, reminding him of everything that he’s sacrificed. It’s a mockery that’s well-deserved. He risked it all for, what, a cute boy? Jonny’s just someone who Patrick met two weeks ago, whether they’d known each other five years ago or not. Out of all the things that Patrick could have given in to, this shouldn’t have been the most tempting. Not when he should care most about his family.

He spends half of the night on his stomach, face pressed against his forearm, against the tattoos, like it can sort out the way he feels inside. There’s a guilt there that he doesn’t know how to handle, because Patrick has never had to feel like he was picking someone over his sisters. Maybe the fact that he has resisted contacting them all these years means that he cares more about their safety than he does Jonny, but maybe it’s also just an easy excuse. Patrick has spent so much time burying his emotions behind layers of coldness and carelessness that he might just as well have stopped caring about his sisters all the same. What has he done for them? He sends them money every month, but he might as well be trying to buy himself an easy conscience that way.

And then there’s Jason, who’d left Patrick with a “See you in my office at 8 straight,” before driving home to his wife. Maybe Jason wouldn’t care about Patrick sleeping with Jonny at all. Maybe he’d think it’s all a game. After all, he’s a smart man – part of him has to realise that Patrick doesn’t want him, that he has needs Jason just can’t fulfil. After all, it’s not like Patrick having sex with Jonny is going to change anything about the fact that his entire existence is practically owned by Jason.

Plus, he doesn’t mind when Patrick makes out with girls in front of his coworkers to keep himself in the closet.

Unfortunately, though, it’s more likely that Jason will get possessive about Patrick. Patrick knows full well that there’s a difference between the play-pretend he does at bars and sleeping with someone he’s genuinely attracted to. No, he’s made the bargain of making himself important to Jason in every way he could manage, and this is one of the consequences of it. Jason won’t accept Patrick sleeping with anyone else. In the end, there is only one thing to do – cut Jonny out of Patrick’s life. As much as Patrick has been enjoying his company, even before today, he can’t trust himself not to give in again, and sometimes, the only possible cut is a clean one.

 

~~~

 

Patrick doesn’t really sleep that night. He lies in bed until he feels antsy from it, and then pulls out a beer and a book to occupy himself. He sits in his comfy armchair for it, because, supposedly, you need to get out bed to keep your mind from associating your bed with non-sleep-related things. He doesn’t know. The only certain thing is that he isn’t going to fall asleep, despite the bone-deep weariness of late-night insomnia and the emotions of the day.

The next morning, he manages to draw up concrete conditions for an arms deal with the IRA. He has conditions, prices, and after looking the plan over with Jason, they agree that this is something that they can work with. They send in the information to the big boss, DiFronzo, hoping for it to get validated early enough for Patrick to be able to call up his IRA contact with a purchase order confirmation. Patrick even gets to go to the Showtime offices in the afternoon to catch up on some money processing.

There’s a message from Jonny on his phone, by then. Patrick doesn’t open it – instead deletes Jonny’s contact entirely, together with their message history.

It helps when he gets to open his trusted excel sheets and go over their money incomes of the past week with Temi. With his general levels of tiredness, his brain doesn’t have any space left for distractions when he’s trying to focus on work. It’s not his most effective state, but Patrick appreciates the feeling of detaching from his body and existing only as an emanation of heat inside the numbers and work information. This Patrick doesn’t need anything. This Patrick thinks about money laundering and transparency, and nothing else.

They get the confirmation for a partnership with the IRA from DiFronzo the next day, which means that Patrick finds himself going back to the HQ offices to work, but it’s fine. It’s more than fine. He’s doing what he’s supposed to do, doing it well, refusing to let any distractions keep him from what he’s supposed to do. He’s giving himself body and mind into work, layered with a haze of exhaustion that follows him through multiple sleepless nights.

Living with insomnia for the past seven-something years, Patrick is used to those weeks, the weeks where everything is a little surreal, a little heavy. He’s learned how to deal with them too, by trying to keep to a strict diet and working out so his body is given at least that much to function on. He goes to the gym four times in the week instead of three, and prays that the exhaustion will finally catch up enough to let him pass out. He doesn’t think that Jonny has anything to do with his sleeping patterns, but in this case, it comes in handy enough. After two sleepless nights, he doesn’t have enough brain power left to agonise over betraying his family or ghosting Jonny, because he’s too busy ordering his brain to just pass out. It’s great.

Still, when he grabs lunch with Sharpy, less than a week after the initial arms shipment should have been done – the Alvarez one, on the 29th of April – Sharpy calls him out on how shit he looks.

“You look like shit.”

Patrick stops his fork in front of his mouth to give Sharpy an unimpressed look. They’re on a neat little restaurant terrace, with the sun blazing down on them. Patrick wishes it was warmer, so Sharpy would want to sit in the shade instead. The sunlight is causing a migraine to slowly build up his skull.

“No but seriously,” Sharpy insists. “Are you overworking yourself on the Rosati deal? Don’t make me sick my wife on you.”

Patrick eats the forkful of salmon, chewing, swallowing and taking a sip from his water before answering. Jason is the one responsible for the Rosati deal, so it’s him and his soldiers that are carrying most of the weight of the project, but that doesn’t mean that the rest of the mob isn’t involved in what they’re doing, not when it’s about big trades like these. Maybe not every soldier does – associates definitely don’t – but on Sharpy’s level of the hierarchy, they definitely have a certain overview.

“I’m coming down with something,” Patrick says lightly, spooning another forkful of food into his mouth. “You shouldn’t stay so close to me, I might be contagious.”

“I’m _definitely_ sicking my wife on you.”

“But what about the germs, Sharpy? Think about Maddy. You can’t have Abby compromise her immune system by hanging out with _me_.”

Patrick finds a genuine grin slipping onto his face, because he can’t really help it when it comes to Maddy – she’s the cutest baby Patrick has ever seen, and he’s going to steal her from her parents one of these days. He’s obviously never having kids of his own, and he’s already a criminal, so a little bit of child kidnapping won’t do much harm. Plus, Maddy already loves him. She doesn’t exactly say words yet or anything, but some of her blubbering totally sounds like she’s saying “Pat” sometimes.

Sharpy makes an aggravated face, like Patrick loving his kid is the worst thing that ever happened to him. Patrick knows he’s fronting. It’s a thing, when practiced liars are bantering at each other; it’s practically impossible to take anything seriously when there’s so obviously little intent behind making it look believable. Sometimes, Patrick lies to Sharpy just for the fun of it, to see how long he can keep up his story until Sharpy picks up on it. This, though, this is fun too.

“Abby won’t get any of your gross germs on her, I can promise you that,” Sharpy says. “She’s a smart lady who can do things like-“ he pauses, actually thinking for a moment, and Patrick just has to snort. “sanitising. _What_?”

 “You don’t know medical words and your wife is a doctor, shame on you.”

“I know enough, shut up.”

“Smart comeback, boss.”

Patrick wiggles his eyebrows at Sharpy, before sticking another forkful into his mouth. It tastes like paper on Patrick’s tongue, because his taste buds have been fucked up for years, but the consistency is sort of nice.

“I’m not your boss,“ Sharpy says, just out of principle. Patrick only ever calls him that when he’s making fun of him anyway, and he’s been the first to claim his higher position in the hierarchy to order Patrick around for lame every day shit. He’s a capo, but not _Patrick’s_ capo. Even if he’s responsible for the mob’s money laundering operations and Patrick does a lot of that. “And how about we get back to you looking like shit? Because I’m not buying that sickness thing.

Patrick shrugs. “I’m just feeling lonely, man. This-“ he points to himself, “is the face of a man who hasn’t gotten laid in _two weeks_ , can you believe it?”

It’s not that he doesn’t want Sharpy to know about his insomnia. Both him and Abby know that that’s a chronic thing Patrick has, and that it’s not going away because he fucked up his brain’s development by doing drugs for the entire duration of his teenage years. But Patrick as a rule tries to avoid answering questions about himself directly. He hates the drugs conversation, even if Sharpy is less irritating than his wife with her pity, and the sleeping isn’t much better. It’s a boring answer, something that can’t be played up for a story.

Plus, regularly talking about his imaginative sex life makes sure none of his coworkers start drawing assumptions from Patrick’s prolonged celibacy. Homosexuality is not a thing in the mob. It’s something you can get killed for. The fact that Patrick is fucking Jason Cirone doesn’t mean anything other than Jason being in as much trouble as him if the information gets out in the open, or at least out to the wrong people. Patrick can’t count on anyone to turn a blind eye on it.

“You look sick because you haven’t gotten laid in two weeks?” Sharpy echoes, clearly unimpressed.

Patrick nods, leaning forward like he wants to share in on a secret. “So if you know any ladies you can hook me up with… I’ll honestly be back on my feet in no time.”

“Really? So you- Ah.” Sharpy pauses, giving Patrick a look like he thinks he has Patrick all figured out. “You’re not sleeping. Is that it?”

Patrick sighs. Fuck Sharpy for being perceptive anyway. “No, I clearly just need to get my dick wet,” he says. “ _Yes_ , I’m not sleeping. It’s nothing new, get over it.”

“You’re cranky too,” Sharpy points out. Patrick gives him an unimpressed look. ”Do you have other people working on the Rosati deal with you at least? Make it less work? I mean I know you and Cirone are the main guys on this, but no offense, it’d probably be good to have someone helping who isn’t two seconds away from falling asleep all the time.”

“I thought the point here was that I’m _not_ sleeping.”

Sharpy waves a hand carelessly. “You know what I mean.”

“I’m good at my job,” Patrick says, feeling the irritation creep under his skin despite himself. This is why he doesn’t like talking about his problems. It just makes him feel more on edge. Things always work out best when he tries to ignore them. “I’m good.”

“Hey, I never said you weren’t good at your job,” Sharpy says placatingly. “You just don’t look at the top of your game right now, and I know work isn’t giving you a lot of room to rest right at the moment.”

“Yeah yeah.”

Patrick stares sullenly at his plate. He’s great at his job, and he’s done bigger jobs than this one on no sleep at all, so he doesn’t really see the problem here. If he needs help, he’ll just get Jason to pick a second soldier to help along with the phone calls and maths stuff.

“You know what? Maybe you do need to get laid.”

Patrick looks up again, one judgemental eyebrow raised. Sex doesn’t make Patrick sleep, he already knows that. Sure, he might fall asleep right after, but that’s not enough. Patrick needs to sleep for more than just a couple of hours here.

“It’s not gonna work.”

“Hey, it might. You’re gonna fall sleep eventually, plus, doesn’t alcohol help? We can go out and get you drunk. You’ll be more efficient at work afterwards.”

“What is my life even,” Patrick complains, “that someone would think making me drink would help me with my work.”

He gets where Sharpy is coming from, because alcohol is one of the things Patrick resorts to when he can’t sleep, but he at least _tries_ to not make it a habit. It’s not a miracle solution anyway – just another thing that can knock him out. When he’s lucky, it can keep him down for longer than an orgasm can. When he’s not, he ends up bent over the toilet, sweating the alcohol he can’t seem to retch out.

“Cmon,” Sharpy coaxes. “Adam and me wanted to go out for hockey night on Saturday anyway, we can multitask and try to find you shots and a lady.”

Patrick would really rather watch hockey than have to flirt with a woman, but he’s stuck here. He can’t say he doesn’t want to after complaining about not getting laid earlier. Maybe shots will even do what the occasional beer at night hasn’t been able to do. He sighs internally, giving Sharpy a shrug.

“Sure. Let’s party hard.”

He flops a pair of fingerguns at Sharpy, causing him to laugh. He’s mobile enough inside the brace to do that much by now at least, even if he’s stuck with it for another three weeks.

“That’s the Peeks I like to see.”

Patrick pulls a face. “Don’t call me that. And now that we’re acknowledging the insomnia, can we hurry up and finish so we can sit somewhere the sun isn’t giving me a headache?”

“Great, you already have the hangover,” Sharpy says cheerfully, clapping his hands together. “You’re ready to go out.”

Patrick hates him, he really does.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter warnings:**  
>  \- Unsafe (oral) sex (but it's finally with Jonny!)  
> \- Mention of long term health consequences from drug abuse during Pat's developmental years (insomnia, loss of taste and appetite)
> 
> As always, comments are appreciated. :)


	4. Chapter 4

****Patrick ends up finding sleep before he even goes out with Sharpy.

It’s not glorious, either. On Friday night, he gets a text from Erica, which he spends a few hours ignoring before opening, just because he’s really not feeling emotionally rested enough to deal with news from her. Whether it’s good or bad, it’s always terrible, just knowing that Patrick can’t be in her life anymore. Or Jessie’s. Or Jackie’s. He’s busy drafting up an email for the Rosatis anyway to inform them of what models are available through their IRA contact. He doesn’t have the time to check up on his family.

It’s a thing Erica has been doing for the past years, sending him messages and pictures to update him on her and the girls’ lives. He never answers them, but it doesn’t stop him from obsessing over them at night, missing his sisters so much that it feels like he’s missing a limb. Sometimes she gets angry at him for reading the messages without answering. Sometimes she just treats him like a sort of diary to confess her thoughts in. Patrick hates and loves those times equally. They make his heart ache from feeling too close to a sister he has nothing left of other than the magnolia on his forearm.

Curiosity wins out, in the end, as soon as Patrick is back at Trump tower and there’s no work-related excuse left for him to fall back on. It always does with his sister. He flops down on his bed and pulls out the phone, ignoring the way his heartbeat is picking up furiously. He feels guilty towards her before even opening it.

_[From: Magnolia]_

_Pat,_

_It’s been a while._

_I wanted to let you know that I got engaged with Caleb last week. I’m sure you’d love him if you met him. He reminds me of you a lot -not in a gross way. But you know he likes to talk too much and protect me even when I tell him I don’t need him, like for the thing with Bryan. He works at the CVS in North Delaware now, the one where that old lady always used to give us candies. Also, he gets along great with Jackie and Dad, so, you know._

_I love him. I feel like that’s reason enough._

_We’re thinking of getting married in August, during the summer holidays. I’ll text you the details, if you want to come. It would make me really, really happy if you did… I miss you. Jessie says I’m wasting my time by writing to you, but I KNOW you’re reading these, and we still get your checks, so you have to be out there somewhere. Just know that you’d be welcome if you wanted to come._

_Love, Erica_

Patrick starts crying at the second sentence.

His little sister is getting married. She’s just 22, she’s still so young, but she’s getting married, and Patrick doesn’t know the guy she’s getting married to. He’s never met him, had heard the name Caleb a total of twice before today, the last time having been about Caleb getting into some dumb fight with a guy called Bryan. For all that he knows, Caleb could be a jerk. He could break Erica’s heart, could be a burden on her for the rest of her life like Dad had been to Mom. He could be plain and boring, and nothing like what Erica deserves. Or maybe he’s so great that he’ll end up cheating on Erica.

Marriage is such a big step, something that Erica could regret in a year, in five, or in twenty. Patrick should be there, by her side, should have made sure that no one got close to her that didn’t deserve to be. Erica told him what Caleb’s job is, sure, but nothing tangible about whether he’s a good person. Is her loving him reason enough? Patrick is the big brother, it should be his job to protect his sisters from ill-meaning men. It’s all wrong, the way Patrick is forced to meet Erica’s messages with silence, when all he wants is to ask more, make sure she’s okay, make sure she’s happy.

And god, she wants him to come to her wedding, but he couldn’t. He wants to so bad, wants to go and finally act like a decent person to his family. But leaving Chicago without notifying Jason of where he’s going is just not possible, and Patrick’s entire decision to cut his sisters out has been based on wanting to keep them safe from the mob. It’s the same story as with Jonny, except a thousand times worse. The less Erica knows about him and what he does, the less there will be proof for anyone to find out how much Patrick cares about her.

It seems ridiculous now that Patrick even considered that not answering Erica’s messages might be because he doesn’t care. His face is wet with tears, eyes swollen, because all he wants is to just say yes. He wants to see her on her most important day, wants to make her happy just as much as he wants to find out who Caleb is. With a quiet sob, he buries his face against one of his many, useless pillows, cradling the phone against his chest.

It’s worse, somehow, that Erica still seems to have such faith in him. She gets the “read” notification on her phone when Patrick opens her messages, sure, and Patrick still makes sure that she has money, even now that she has her teacher’s salary to at least partly sustain herself. But Patrick is going to fail her, yet again, and it’s going to hurt her. God, Patrick wishes that after over five years, she’d at least start not to put her hopes in him anymore. He doesn’t want her to be sad because of him. She should have the best day of her life, surrounded by the people she loves, and realise that Patrick can’t be one of those people anymore.

None of it is fair, and it makes Patrick’s chest ache until he has to curl up into a ball and wait until the tears dry up. It’s hard to count the passing hours, but it doesn’t matter. Patrick doesn’t have anywhere to be but this bed, in this room that belongs to a mafia boss, where Jason has cameras set up for whenever he wants to spy on Patrick. All he can do is lie there and feel miserable until it passes enough that Patrick is able to push it all back down again.

Not tonight, though. Tonight, Patrick can’t be the cold, unfeeling person he’s tried to build himself up to be. Tonight, Patrick is going to cry and miss his little sister. The person who used to be his best friend, and who believed that he was a good person even after Mom and Dad had kicked him out for being a junkie. The person who’s grown up to be a woman he barely knows, but hopes with all his heart has found a relationship that will leave her fulfilled and happy.

He falls asleep like that, on top of his sheets, barely noticing the way his consciousness fades into nothing. Emotions soften at the edges, until the exhaustion of the past week catches up with him and pins his every limb to the mattress. He feels worn, empty. He falls asleep. At some point during the night, he gets the comforter over himself, curls up even tighter, but by morning he has no memory of doing it.

 

~~~

 

All that remains the next morning is a feeling of morosity that follows him all the way throughout the day. A full seven hours of sleep mean that he’s feeling better, at least in terms of energy, but his phone remains a burning weight in his pocket, reminding him that there’s things that he just can’t do right by. There are people he misses who miss him in return, and Patrick still chooses to do nothing about that.

It’s a relief, after that, to go out with Sharpy and Adam. Patrick makes a jump to the Showtime office for two hours during the afternoon, once the arms deal with the IRA is done and finally sealed, and promptly invites Temi and Amelie along. He’s pretty sure that Temi is crushing on Amelie, and Patrick can be a good friend when he bothers to try. He’ll find them excuses to hang out outside of work, no problem.

“I thought we were trying to get you to meet girls,” Sharpy says when the three of them join up with him and Adam, filing into the small booth Adam saved them. “But looks like you brought your own.”

Amelie blushes, looking decidedly uncomfortable, which Patrick promptly decides is either because she likes Temi back, or because she’s uncomfortable being accused of sleeping with her sort-of-boss. Not because she’s considering that Patrick really might have taken her along for that purpose. Just to be sure, though, he’ll have to make sure to steer her away from him. Given that Sharpy invited him along to give him an occasion to hook up, it shouldn’t be too hard.

“You’re so funny, Sharpy,” Patrick says, batting his lashes. “Anyway, Amelie, Sharpy, Sharpy, Amelie, Sharpy, Temi, you’ve seen him around. And that’s Adam. Amelie and Temi are coworkers from Showtime.”

Amelie is technically a mob associate now, since she knows that Showtime exists for money-laundering purposes and still works for their PR. Patrick won’t tell her that, because Amelie might not appreciate being told that she’s officially part of the mob structure, which Patrick would find vaguely amusing, given that she’s fine with working _with_ them. Either way, though, there’s no need to pretend that they have normal jobs around her.

It doesn’t take long for her to loosen up in their presence, once Sharpy has ordered two rounds of shots, and there’s hockey playing in the background. Patrick is distracted from the conversation, watching the screen more often than not, but he hears her and Temi laugh. They seem to have involved Sharpy in their conversation too, who’s struggling a little with Temi’s brand broken English, but seems otherwise quite taken with Patrick’s coworkers.

“I’ve been wondering,” Amelie says loudly over the background noise, “do all of you people call each other by weird nicknames? We have Shawsy, Temi, Sharpy.” She nods towards Patrick. “What’s his?”

“Patrick,” Patrick says immediately, giving Sharpy a pointed look.

Sharpy completely ignores his stink eye, grinning like an idiot as he informs Amelie that, “We like to call him Peekaboo or Peeks because he was a literal baby when he got hired. I mean look at him, he’s still tiny and cute. Makes you wanna pinch his cheeks and everything.”

Amelie makes a face like she really wants to answer Sharpy’s banter with something that she finds hilarious, but doesn’t quite dare yet in Sharpy’s presence. High-ranking mob officials can be intimidating for newbies. With Sharpy being the way he is, though, Patrick bets that her qualms will be gone by the end of the evening. He rolls his eyes.

“Just because you hate your name, _Patrick Sharp_ , doesn’t mean that I don’t want to be called mine,” he tells Sharpy, eyes circling back to the TV screens above the bar to check the score.

His gaze roam down to the bar distractedly, and that’s when he sees Jonny. Jonny Toews. Leaning against the bar counter and chatting up a tall, handsome guy with tattoos on both arms.

His heart stops.

Out of all the people Patrick had expected to see here, Jonny definitely hadn’t been at the top of the list. In fact, between the insomnia, the Rosati deal, and Erica’s text yesterday, Patrick hadn’t been thinking about Jonny at all. Not about how hot he looks under the dim light of the bar, not about his soft, golden skin, and definitely not about the way his mouth felt around Patrick’s cock. But there he is, leaning close to the guy in front of him, body language open and inviting in a way that makes Patrick’s stomach fizzle.

He’s flirting, Patrick realises. Flirting with someone that isn’t Patrick.

Patrick bites the insides of his cheek, looks away from the bar. That he’s in the same bar as Jonny while Jonny tries to get it on with some new guy is unlucky, but it’s not really a surprise. Anyone with a pair of functioning eyes would be into Jonny, especially in those jeans that Jonny can’t possibly have picked out with any other purpose in mind than drawing attention to his ass. Jonny laughs at something the guy says, making Patrick’s gut lurch unpleasantly. This is normal. It’s expected, that Jonny would move on as soon as Patrick dropped him.

“-another round, Patrick?”

The guy lifts his shirt, nodding towards his stomach like he’s showing Jonny something. A tattoo, from the looks of it, although Patrick can’t be sure from the distance. It’s a flimsy excuse to show off his abs if Patrick has ever seen one. Patrick hates that he’s hot, and that Jonny looks like he thinks so too. An irrational part of him is angry at the both of them, for being here, for flirting in front of him when he can have none of it. Not Jonny, not any of this.

Patrick realises a split-second too late that he should probably stop staring when the guy turns to order something at the bar. Because Jonny looks over, then, catching Patrick’s gaze before Patrick can look away. A flash of surprise passes over his face, and then he actually smiles across the room, tentative, like he’s hoping that Patrick will acknowledge him.

Patrick’s stomach does a flip, and he looks away. Jonny’s smile is still crooked. Still lovely. It makes Patrick feel off-kilter, itching inside his skin, because he wants- Jonny’s right there, he’s flirting with this douche, and he’s _still_ smiling at Patrick like he wouldn’t mind Patrick coming over right now this moment. It’s honestly unfair.

“Hey, anyone in there?” Sharpy says.

Patrick blinks, turning back towards him. “Sorry. Zoned out.”

Sharpy frowns, a worried twist to his mouth. Patrick hasn’t told him that he managed to cry himself to sleep last night, so Sharpy is probably assuming that Patrick is still out of it from sleeping too little.

“Never mind, then. I’ll go,” Sharpy says, smoothing out his brow to instead shrug dramatically. “I’ll sacrifice myself for the community.”

“Oh, right,” Patrick says, catching on. Sharpy was asking him to get another round. That’s something he can definitely do. “No, don’t worry about it, I’ll go. What do you guys want?”

“Shots,” Temi says cheerfully.

“You heard the man,” Sharpy confirms.

“Aye aye, boss,” Patrick says.

He squeezes out in front of Temi and Amelie, deciding that if he’s going to the bar anyway, it’s as good an excuse as any to see if Jonny legitimately wants him to come over. He isn’t looking at Patrick anymore, instead looking at his date. He’s not smiling, though, not like earlier. He looks irritated, if anything, and Patrick wonders for a split-second if Jonny’s earlier inviting smile had been a plea for help to get away from some douche after all.

Jonny’s date leans over the counter to order again, and Jonny leans back, arms crossed in front of his chest. It creates a space between them that Patrick looks at once and promptly decides to steer towards. It’s an access to the counter. Plus, Patrick will be able to make sure that everything is okay with Jonny.

He slides in between Jonny and the guy, immediately resting his elbow on the counter to lean in towards Jonny, smiling like he’s John Travolta grinning down at Olivia Newton-John. Except that he’s smiling up, in this case, because Jonny is unfortunately still taller than him.

“Hey,” Jonny’s date says crossly. “You can’t-“

“This guy bothering you?” Patrick cuts him off.

It’s all easy smiles, and he’s ready to back off immediately if things turn out to actually be fine, but instead of laughing, Jonny gives the guy a cold look over Patrick’s shoulder. Patrick raises both eyebrows. This doesn’t look like he read Jonny’s body language wrong at all.

“Actually yeah,” Jonny says shortly. “I prefer guys who understand that ‘No’ is a full sentence.”

He flicks his fingers against a full shot glass next to him. There’s another two sitting a little further off, next to where Jonny’s date had apparently been paying. The guy in question makes a noise of protest, staring at both Jonny and Patrick, face growing red with a mixture of anger and embarrassment.

“I was just buying you drinks, man,” the guy snaps. “No reason to be a little bitch about it.”

“Mhm, yeah okay.” Jonny shakes his head. “I think we’re done here, _man_.”

Patrick turns towards the guy looking him up and down. He doesn’t think this is someone who wants to mess with him. Patrick might need to point that out to him. Especially since the guy looks like he’s really working himself up, leaning closer and closer to angry with every second passing.

“I’m sure it was all a misunderstanding,” Patrick says smoothly. His smile is as cold as the ice in his eyes. “No hard feelings. But you should probably listen to my friend here.” He tilts his head towards Jonny slightly.

The guys swallows, uncertainty flickering over his face. He doesn’t seem to understand what’s happening exactly, but his gut instinct is apparently enough to have him back off an inch, sway from angry back to embarrassed. His eyes roam Patrick’s face nervously, flickering to Jonny, and then back. Patrick just stares at him until he’s squirming uncomfortably. Finally, the guy mumbles something under his breath. Insults, probably, but that he’s smart enough not to say loud enough for Patrick to understand.

Patrick lifts an eyebrow. “Did you say something? It’s quite loud here, I couldn’t hear.”

The guy gives him a furious look, but he turns around and storms off rather than respond. Patrick snorts. What a fucking coward.

He waits for the guy to be out of sight before he turns back towards Jonny and smiles, wide and playful. “Guess he didn’t have anything left to say, did he?”

“I guess not,” Jonny says. “And I guess you just can’t seem to help yourself, eh?” He smirks. “As long as you watch out for that wrist.”

The tension in his shoulders seems to bleed away, stance loosening into something closer to how he had been standing earlier. Except that this time it’s not the other guy he’s leaning towards, but Patrick. Patrick who he’s eating up with his eyes, whose mouth he gets stuck on. Patrick licks his lips automatically, watches Jonny’s pupils dilate.

“Help myself?” he asks, breath hitching ever-so-slightly.

He wishes Jonny wasn’t so easy to read. Patrick already made the decision to cut Jonny out. He’s not supposed to have thoughts like the ones Jonny is conjuring up in him. But this is a lot to stay indifferent to. Jonny’s entire body language is literally screaming how much he wants to jump Patrick.

Patrick’s stomach is doing the whole flipping routine again, mind hazy from alcohol and heavy with want. He wants to lean in and kiss Jonny’s perfect mouth, crowd him up against the bar. Take this one good thing he could have so easily. Alcohol certainly isn’t the only reason why Patrick’s mouth feels dry all of the sudden.

Then his brain catches up with what Jonny’s talking about. “Oh. The girl. At the bar last time.” The one Patrick made up to explain his wrist injury. He eyes the brace. “Yeah, that one’s getting pretty tiring, I’m looking forward to having both hands to use again.” He wiggles his fingers. “Two and a half weeks left on that baby.”

“Cheers to that,” Jonny says, lifting the shot in Patrick’s direction before putting it back down on the bar. He nods down at it. “You want this? Because I don’t.”

Between all the things that Patrick needs to say no to right now, alcohol doesn’t even register.

“Sure.”

He downs the shot in one go, focussing on the burn in his throat so he doesn’t end up doing something stupid. There’s another two shots lined up on the bar, making Patrick wonder if the “No” the guy hadn’t been able to take from Jonny had been about the drinks.

“TJ’s gonna be disappointed,” Jonny says then, leaning against the bar a little. “He told me to hook up with someone to get _you_ out of my system.” He nudges Patrick’s shoulder. “And yet here we are.”

“Here we are,” Patrick agrees. His shoulder is tingling where Jonny touched him. He catches Jonny glancing towards the table where Patrick’s coworkers are sitting, and takes a deep breath. “Yeah, uhm, my friends from work. Felice isn’t there, so no wrist-breaking action tonight.” He makes fingerguns at Jonny from where his elbow is resting on the counter. “I’m supposed to be getting the next round of shots for them, actually.”

It’s probably a good thing that they’re here, so there’s someone there to remind Patrick that touching Jonny, kissing him, slipping his hands under Jonny’s shirt, are all things that he can’t be doing. He fiddles with the empty shot glass in his hands. The barista isn’t far off, he could easily call her to order the drinks he’s here for.

Instead, he finds himself stuck on the fact that Jonny was in the middle of trying to get Patrick out of his system. With some random dude at a bar. Clearing his throat, he lets himself lean in a little more against the counter.

“I gotta say, your taste in men is definitely lacking,” he says lightly. “Me? Definitely a terrible idea. That guy?” he gestures vaguely in the direction the guy disappeared towards. “Didn’t seem to pass the cut either. Also TJ.” He makes a mock-disgusted face. “Come on Jonny. You’re hot, you’re nice, you can do better than that.”

“I’m not gonna argue about Max,” Jonny allows, shrugging a little. “Might not have been the best choice. But TJ? How could I do better than that? Isn’t that the ideal thing, your partner also being your best friend?”

Jonny looks somewhere over Patrick’s shoulder, and when Patrick follows his gaze, to where TJ is standing a little far off, phone in one hand, miming… something. Jonny seems to understand, because he rolls his eyes, grinning, and flips TJ off, before turning his attention back to Patrick.

“And you?” He gives Patrick a once-over. “What makes you a bad choice? Yeah, you have a girlfriend and you ghosted me which wasn’t great, but you’re hot, you play abysmal Mario Cart, we had fun, and you make me feel more turned on just by standing here like this than Max showing me his abs has, so-” He shrugs again, smiling a little. “I think I’m okay with my terrible ideas.”

It’s dirty pool, Patrick feels, the way Jonny is outright admitting that Patrick is turning him on. With the added heat of alcohol buzzing under Patrick’s skin, and the way _Jonny_ looks in the dimmed lights, it’s like the universe is conspiring against Patrick, trying to turn him on in return.

“You're way hotter than TJ,” Patrick says, glancing over his shoulder again, to where TJ is typing away on his phone. “And going after me is stupid, because of all the reasons you said, yeah.” His hand is itching to reach forward and brush up against Jonny’s hip. He balls his fingers into a fist. “Still not single. And I have terrible decision-making.”

“I have stupid ideas, you have terrible decision making, sounds like a combination with potential to me,” Jonny says, shifting a little so his bare arm brushes against Patrick’s for just a moment. He shoots Patrick a look. “But you aren't interested. Too bad.”

“Yeah,” Patrick says breathily. “I'm not interested. I should probably-“

He nods towards the table with Sharpy and the others, but doesn't otherwise make a move to leave.

Jonny watches him for a second, tracking Patrick’s expression like he’s trying to puzzle him out. Then he stands back, hands in his pockets, and Patrick can tell he’s going to say something to ruin Patrick before he even opens his mouth.

“Too bad,” Jonny repeats faux-casually. “That you aren’t interested. I guess I’m going to have to find someone else to keep me company tonight.” He glances around the room, stopping on some guy. Patrick doesn’t bother following his gaze. “What about him? You think he’d be into going to the back alley with me?” He shoots Patrick a look, smirking. “Or him?” He glances at another guy. “I bet he’d like to come home with me. We could swap flannel shirts, I don’t have one in that colour yet. Or maybe I get TJ to check out the Berlin with me tonight, what do you think? How should I get you out of my system?”

Patrick stares at him with dark eyes, mind stuck on how easily Jonny manages to talk about asking some random other dude to fuck in a back alley. How he nods towards the second one, like he doesn’t even care who it is that he goes home with. Like all he needs is to get laid, by whoever says yes faster. It’s infuriating. Patrick wants to wipe Jonny’s stupid grin from his face. Preferably with his mouth. Or his dick. Anything that would make Jonny stop acting like he can replace Patrick with the snap of a finger.

It shouldn’t be making Patrick hard to hear Jonny talking about fucking other men like this, but it is. He’s turned on, in equal parts as he is frustrated, because fuck. He doesn’t want to look at these people and imagine them with Jonny. He doesn’t want them to get what he can’t have. Not when it’s being rubbed into his face like that. Not when Jonny’s clearly taunting him, and Patrick is falling for it, unable to do anything but watch the trap close around him.

“You do that?” Patrick asks, voice a deep rumble. “Fuck strangers in back alleys?”

Jonny shuffles a little, throwing a glance to the door before locking eyes with Patrick again, in a staring contest that makes Patrick feel like the ground has been ripped out from under him.

“Yeah,” Jonny answers, voice low, but confident. “I like it. And sometimes-” He looks at Patrick, raising his eyebrows the slightest bit, “sometimes even a ten minute cab ride is too long to wait, you know.”

Patrick thinks that maybe Jonny is trying to kill him. He’s picturing it now, taking Jonny into a back alley and pressing him against a wall, getting off hard and fast and dirty. Shoving his hands down Jonny’s pants to show him exactly what it is that he’s doing to Patrick and pay him back in kind. Maybe bite that pretty neck of his and mark it up. Fuck, Patrick’s so turned on he’s not thinking clearly, and that’s bad. It’s _bad_.

Quickly, he glances back towards his friends’ table, and thank god, no one’s looking their way, but Patrick doesn’t doubt that they _could_ see things. In his body language, in Jonny’s. And then there’s Jonny himself, who talks about ten minutes being too long, and Patrick gets that, he does. Right now, he wants nothing more than have Jonny right here, right this moment, and fuck whoever might be watching.

“I’m not fucking you outside,” he hisses, because he still has _some_ sense at least. He runs a hand over his face, trying to get his dick to chill out. “Jesus. You’re killing me. You’re so-“

He opens his eyes again, staring right into Jonny’s dark ones, picking up on the defiance in them. It like a sucker punch to the gut. He wants to grab Jonny’s arm and drag him off to the restroom so he can finally get his mouth on him, but he can’t. He can’t be that obvious in public. He has to actually ask Jonny and count on nobody listening in on their conversation, and it’s driving him mad.

“Restroom?” he asks, putting challenge in his own voice, even though he knows he already lost here.

The smile he gets in response is plain unfair in how genuine it is, wide and victorious, but with an edge of surprise, like Jonny hadn’t expected his tricks to work as well as they did. It’s cute, on top of everything else. Even more so when Jonny glances to the table with Patrick’s coworkers and tries to suppress his grin to the best of his ability. It takes him a couple of seconds.

“You go first,” Jonny finally says, tapping his fingers against the wooden counter and shifting. “You go first, I’ll follow.”

“Yes boss,” Patrick says, doing a mock salute like he’s not panting for Jonny’s dick, and turning on his heels to make for the restroom.

There’s only two cabins, one for men, and the other for women, and Patrick is fiercely glad for it, because it means that there will be no neighbours to hear in on them. He waits until the person using the men’s restroom leaves, flushing behind him, and then slips inside, immediately taking advantage of the freedom of being alone to adjust himself in his pants.

And then press the heel of his hands against his dick, because actually, some pressure sounds really fucking great right now. Better than pausing to think, that’s for sure, because even with the alcohol clouding Patrick’s judgement, he knows that this is a bad idea already, and he wants it too much to make himself sick with the knowledge that he should be saying no, just walking away. He just wants Jonny.

It doesn’t take long for Jonny to follow. He locks the door behind himself, looking about as turned on as Patrick feels when he takes him in, beautiful and here for _Patrick_. Then Jonny is grabbing Patrick’s face and crashing their mouths together, hot and demanding.

“Oh fuck,” Patrick pants.

Jonny’s touch is like an electric current that goes through Patrick’s body. It’s like being slammed into a brick wall, a little bit, but so much better. It’s all-consuming, all-encompassing, so, so right. Patrick can barely remember what Jason’s touch feels like when he’s like this, with Jonny’s mouth on his, and Jonny’s hand on his face. It’s unfair how easy Patrick is for this, how much he wants this, when he tried so hard to be good, to be-

Jonny slides his tongue into Patrick’s mouth, and Patrick can’t _think_. He groans, pushing into Jonny, closer still, wrapping both arms around Jonny’s waist so he can squeeze him, hard, like the way he’s answering the movement of Jonny’s mouth. He pushes Jonny back, against the wall, and kisses him like he’s been starving for it, lifting himself up on the tip pf his toes just so that he can press Jonny back even harder.

He feels fucking high. God, Patrick’s _been_ high, and this is just as good, the same kind of rush that makes Patrick feel on top of the world, because he’s got Jonny under his lips, and what more could he possibly want?

“I’ve been wanting to do this since the moment I saw you in that booth,” Jonny mumbles into the kiss, nipping at Pat’s bottom lip.

Patrick wants to say that he’s been wanting to do this for the past three weeks, that he’d do this every waking moment if he could, but it’s too complicated inside his mind to be a complete truth, so instead he tears himself from Jonny’s mouth, just long enough that he can say, “I want you so fucking bad,” before stealing another kiss. “Your fucking smile, the way you look at me, those _pants_ -“

“Yeah? You want me? You can have me,” Jonny says breathlessly, pressing himself closer, making Patrick feel how hard he is. “You just gotta take me. You got the guts for that? C’mon, Pat.”

He fists a hand in Patrick’s curls, bringing their mouths back together, and Patrick loves it, loves that Jonny is trying to rile him up even more, even though Patrick is already as into this as he thinks is physically possible. For a moment, he even wonders if by “take” Jonny means that Patrick should just turn around and fuck himself on Jonny’s cock, or if Jonny wants Patrick on his knees, or just his hand, and it’s- the way Jonny’s saying it, he’s leaving that choice up to Patrick. Like all of this is Patrick, Patrick choosing, Patrick taking. It’s so fucking surreal.

He bites down on Jonny’s bottom lip in answer, pushes his thigh against Jonny’s hard cock. Patrick doesn’t really want to get fucked right now, especially not here, but he does want to give to Jonny, as much as he can. Desperately, he runs his mouth along Jonny’s neck, licking up the sweat there before dropping to suck on the spot right under his ear, hard. He wants to mark Jonny up, make him his, even if it’s only for this one moment.

It makes Jonny swear, long and drawn out, but he still manages to snake his hand between their bodies to reach for Patrick’s belt. Patrick immediately makes the space Jonny needs, wordless and hectic, lifting his hips enough that Jonny can work his fly open, before mirroring the gesture, fumbling as he tries to work around the brace. He reaches inside Jonny’s pants with his good hand and circles his fingers around the base of Jonny’s cock immediately, where it’s hot and pulsing against his palm. Jonny’s own hand falters on Patrick’s cock, moaning in a way that has Patrick grin and press his nose against Jonny’s sweaty temple.

Soon, though, Jonny has gotten himself back together enough to remind Patrick of the conversation they’d had the last time they saw each other. About Jonny’s mouth, Jonny’s hands, and how not even straight guys could resist coming back after they’d had a taste of it. It’s not hard to believe, with the way Jonny’s fingers wrap around him, giving him long, hard strokes that have Patrick’s entire body shake.

It makes him feel floaty, in a way, just so focussed down on the feeling of Jonny’s hand on him that it’s like everything else falls away and all Patrick can do is try and move his hand as he breathes wetly against Jonny’s temple. He keens when Jonny slides his thumb over the slit, and has to press Jonny back into the wall again, balling both hands into Jonny’s shirt because he’s pretty sure that otherwise his balance is about to be compromised.

“You have a fucking awesome dick, you know that?” Jonny pants, mouthing at Patrick’s jaw, his throat, hand dipping to Patrick’s balls to squeeze once before moving up to the head again. “‘m gonna jerk off thinking about this later, thinking about your cock. Gonna come so hard.”

“Fuck,” Patrick pants. “Oh fuck, Jonny.”

Every part of him feels on fire, from Jonny’s hand, Jonny’s words, and everything they do to him. Patrick is a man of words, someone who gets told to shut up on the regular, but right now he’s got nothing. Nothing but the all-consuming feeling of Jonny against him, the smell of Jonny everywhere, forcing even their surroundings and its smell out of Patrick’s consciousness.

“Yeah, Pat,” Jonny coaxes, like he doesn’t even care that Patrick let go of his dick. His hand just speeds up on Patrick, making Patrick’s bones feel like jelly. “C’mon. C’mon, Pat. You’re so-”

The thing is, Patrick might be a little bit conditioned to following orders, especially during sex. Jonny telling him to come, added to the magic that he’s working with his fingers and the fact that Patrick actually legitimately wants to give him everything he’d think to ask of him makes pretty quick work of Patrick’s resistances. He hiccups against Jonny’s mouth, and it’s completely instinctive when his body just seizes up and comes, right into Jonny’s hand.

He doesn’t even make a sound, just stutters in his movements and buries his face against Jonny’s cheek as the sensations wash over him. Jesus. Fuck.

“Oh my god,” he says.

Jonny’s going to fucking ruin him for anyone else, and especially Jason. It’s too good, to perfect, the height of the rush. He wants nothing more than go boneless against Jonny and maybe make out with him, somewhere that isn’t a dirty club bathroom.

Gathering himself up, Patrick shakes himself and kisses Jonny instead, soft and sweet, before deciding that he might as well just go for it and dropping to his knees in front of Jonny, barely feeling how hard the bathroom floor is. Jonny groans. Patrick looks up at him as he tucks himself back into his own pants, and smiles, a little dopey from the feel-good hormones and the alcohol and everything good that Jonny is making him feel. Jonny is looking at him like he’s never seen anything hotter in his entire life, mouth hanging open and eyes blown with arousal.

Patrick kisses the inside of his hip, where there’s still his pants covering him, and then pushes his boxers down enough that he can run his tongue over Jonny’s cock instead. He takes him inside his mouth, humming when the taste fills his mouth, before pulling off again and looking up with a loose smirk.

“Told you I wanted to taste you,” he says.

His voice is definitely a little fucked, just from how out of it he feels, and he settles for just going back in and taking Jonny’s cock deeper, hollowing his cheeks as he sucks, watching Jonny’s thighs tremble in an effort to hold him up.

“Yeah?” Jonny says breathlessly, staring down at Patrick in wonder. “Me too.”

Patrick has his lips sealed around Jonny’s cock when Jonny lifts his fingers to his lips, and he nearly chokes from it. Jonny licks his fingers, licks Patrick’s come like it’s delicious, and Patrick feels his spent cock twitch painfully at the sight. In answer, he takes Jonny’s cock deeper, and deeper, until he can relax his throat and get Jonny’s cock past his natural resistance. Fuck, Jonny made him feel so good, he deserves nothing but the best in terms of this too.

“Oh, oh,” Jonny gasps out eloquently, fingers finding their way back into Patrick’s hair, head thrown back against the wall.

He sounds wrecked, and perfect, and Patrick uses his hand to squeeze Jonny’s balls lightly, sucking hard until he can feel them tighten, and his fingers pull harder at Patrick’s hair. Patrick closes his eyes and takes Jonny’s cock deeper, until his nose is pressed against Jonny’s trimmed pubes.

“I’m gonna,” Jonny warns. “Pat, I’m-”

Patrick swallows Jonny’s come easily, lets it trickle right down his throat, and only pulls back when Jonny’s cock has stopped twitching, suckling one last time around the head before letting go. He has the crazy urge to press a kiss to the tip of Jonny’s dick too, but he’s more than aware that that’s too much, too affectionate, so instead he gets up, holding himself against Jonny’s hip for balance, and presses his lips to the corner of Jonny’s mouth in a gentle, closed-mouthed kiss.

“Guess I didn’t really help you get me out of your system,” he says, leaning back as he gently tucks Jonny back into his pants.

His eyes skim Jonny’s clothes, trying to see if there’s anything there that would be too easy to spot on the outside. A few drops of come landed on Jonny’s jeans, but they’re drying already, and when Patrick pats the flannel down, you can barely see anything.

“No, not really,” Jonny says breathlessly, smile silly and wide in the best way.

Patrick steps back, looks down at himself to put his clothes back in order. As much as he wants to touch Jonny, still, he probably shouldn’t. Even if Jonny’s smile is too pretty not to be drawn in by.

“Never gonna get you off my mind, am I?” Jonny adds obliviously, before following Patrick and pulling him in for a kiss anyway, soft and wanting.

Patrick can’t help it, he melts into the kiss. He wants to be strong, and not this needy mess that Jonny and Jonny-induced orgasms seem to make him, but he can’t. Not when Jonny’s mouth is so sweet, and he runs his fingers alongside Patrick’s jaw like he’s something special.

Patrick doesn’t want to go back out there. Doesn’t want to go back to pretend like he doesn’t want to kiss Jonny and maybe take him out for ice cream to see more of his smiles and eye-twinkling, deadpan humour. So he doesn’t pull back from Jonny kissing him, lifts his hand to instead tug at Jonny’s bottom lip ever-so-slightly with his thumb, and then follows him for one last kiss when Jonny tries to pull away. Only then does he stop himself, giving Jonny a bittersweet smile.

“You should,” he answers. “I’m not going to break up with Tara.” Tara’s good, Tara’s an old lie. One that Patrick is comfortable with. There’s already an entire personality constructed for her that he’d based on his childhood friend and only needs to age up a few years. “Not that I don’t wanna fuck you again, but-“ He shakes himself. “Like I said. You can do better. And I shouldn’t be doing this.”

“You keep talking about should or shouldn’t,” Jonny says with a sigh, leaning back against the tiled wall.

Patrick smiles wryly. “I do, don’t I?”

It’s the one problem with the persona he constructed for himself, here. That guy isn’t straight. He isn’t even bi. Patrick made up an entire backstory about a girlfriend and a strict family who he’s trying to be straight for, just in case Jonny asks, but he hasn’t really tried to convince Jonny that Patrick doesn’t want to be here. If he’d talked about wanting, Jonny wouldn’t have trouble respecting his wishes. But Patrick hasn’t _wanted_ Jonny to back off. Because he doesn’t. And his reality really is one where should and want just don’t go hand in hand.

“What about what you want?” Jonny asks, frowning, always his sweet, oblivious self. Patrick sways drunkenly, eyes dropping to his mouth again. “What _I_ want? I’m not asking you to break up with your girlfriend, I’m just-” He gives a small shrug, burying his hands in his pockets. “I like you, Pat. And the sex we’ve had has been amazing, it’s- Your girlfriend doesn’t have to find out. Are you not allowed to have friends? How is she to know what we do behind closed doors? I want you, I want to-” He rubs his neck, looks at Patrick. “I want to keep seeing you.”

Patrick nods minutely, then sighs, tearing his eyes from Jonny’s mouth to look into his eyes instead. He wants to see Jonny again too, of course he does. This separation, between want and should, it makes all the difference, and Jonny doesn’t understand it, because his world is simpler. Because Patrick hasn’t tried to teach him the rules of his own.

It would be so much easier to pretend that they don’t exist.

“Maybe I talk about should because I don’t want what I should want,” Patrick mumbles. He blinks up at Jonny, biting his lip. “Maybe you should try calling me. I might pick up.”

He doesn’t want to make promises right now, when he’s high on post-orgasm haze and drunk. He’s deleted Jonny’s number anyway. Even if he probably still has the paper Jonny initially gave him with the number on it. It doesn’t matter. What he needs to do now, is to get out of this restroom and get back to his friends before they suspect anything that Patrick won’t be able to explain away. Even inviting Jonny to call him is stupid.

It’s hypocritical, really, that Patrick has felt like Jonny was giving him too many openings, when Patrick finds himself doing exactly the same. Because he is, increasingly so. He wants to see Jonny again. He wants to keep making stupid decisions and pretending that it’s just Jonny and him, that the outside world doesn’t exist.

“Maybe I will call you,” Jonny says.

There’s a promise in his voice. Patrick just wonders if _he_ will be foolish enough pick up.

 

~~~

 

“Who was that?” Sharpy asks as soon as Patrick has wandered back to the table.

Patrick shrugs. He’s made sure that there’s no jizz on his clothes, and if there’s a slight rasp to his voice from deep throating Jonny’s cock, his coworkers won’t hear it over the background noises. You can’t even hear the hockey commentary from where they’re sitting, the music is playing so loud, and it’s still full enough that there’s a general volume upheld by chatter.

“Friend from high school,” he tells Sharpy, sliding back into the booth next to a much more drunk looking Amelie. “Josh. Apparently he ended up in Chicago too.”

“It’s a small world,” Adam says wisely.

Patrick snorts.

Sharpy and the guys really must have gotten quite a few more shots while he was gone. Amelie has an arm slung over Temi’s shoulders, Adam is cross-eyed as he examines his empty glass, and Temi is way more relaxed than he would be sober with a girl so close to him. It’s a development that’s to Patrick’s advantage at least, in terms of credibility, because drunk people won’t question him as much as they would sober. Not that he needs cheap tricks for his lies to be believed, but still.

“Where did you go to high school again?” Sharpy asks.

“Florida,” Patrick lies. “Man, had to take Josh to the bathroom, he was so wasted, he would have puked all over the bar.”

“Well, if he’s from _Florida_ …” Sharpy drawls.

Patrick kicks him under the table. “Don’t be a hater ‘cause we know how to party harder than Canada, man.”

“I can clearly handle a party better than your friend.”

“You don’t even know how much he had.”

Patrick crosses his arms, suppressing a grin. He’s pretty sure that Sharpy is going to figure out at some point that Patrick isn’t actually from Florida, but he’s not too worried about that. He lies to Sharpy during every conversation that they have, averaging around five times each, and Sharpy thinks it’s hilarious to figure out which are the lies. As long as Patrick sticks to “Josh” being his buddy from high school, he’s good on the rest. Florida is just the decoy lie.

“That I don’t,” Sharpy allows, leaning back into the booth with a yawn. “That I don’t, Peekaboo.”

“ _Peekaboo_ ,” Amelie giggles.

Patrick shakes his head long-sufferingly.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter warnings:**  
>  \- Alcohol  
> \- Consent: some douche won't take no for an answer from Jonny but Patrick chases him off  
> \- Sex: Unsafe oral sex, choice of location that really isn't cool for the people who just wanted to take a piss


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I missed a posting date, but I was also in the middle of a move to another country, so hopefully you'll forgive me ;)

Patrick gets home late, feeling floaty and off, like tonight didn’t really happen. The fact that he had sex with Jonny, again, that he just sat back at the table with his friends and told them some bullshit excuse about his old friend from high school, Josh, puking in the bathroom, it’s all like a dream. Patrick had expected consequences, but it’s all been alcohol, noise and laughter. Like maybe, if he squints hard enough, he can pretend that Jonny belongs to a second reality that never has to cross over into Patrick’s real life.

It’s jarring, coming home to an empty condo after that. Trump tower has never been a space that has truly belonged to Patrick, is the symbol of Patrick not even really belonging to himself. It only serves to reinforce that dream-like feeling. The Patrick that lives here doesn’t suck cock in club bathrooms. The Patrick that lives here is a high functioning business man with no vulnerabilities. It’s two different versions of himself, and there is no doubt in which of the two leads the happier life.

There are empty beer bottles lying on the ground next to Patrick’s bed that he’ll need to clean up eventually, sheets that are undone and still smell of the last time Patrick had sex in them, because Jason still isn’t helping him change the sheets, and Patrick’s wrist hasn’t fixed itself yet. There’s empty space that looks like it could swallow Patrick up whole, filled with the loneliness that Patrick has cultivated by keeping everyone out. It’s home.

When Patrick slides into bed, he dreams of being back at Ty’s place. It’s bright and open and messy, more lived in than any of Patrick’s rooms have ever been. It used to drive him crazy all the same, the way Ty couldn’t be assed to clean up after himself. But the apartment is smaller than Patrick remembers it, lit with sunlight, littered with plants. Succulents on the table. Patrick hears voices from the adjacent room, and allows himself to close his eyes, take that moment of rest.

There’s Jonny there, in his dream, and Patrick wakes up feeling like a fool. For his dreams, for letting Jonny get under his skin so much that Patrick can’t separate his desire for Jonny’s body from everything else that he wants from Jonny. Things that Jonny never even offered, that have never been on the table, because Patrick isn’t supposed to have sex, and much less fall for cute college boys. His chest feels too full with things that shouldn’t be there.

Patrick buries his face under a pillow to smother himself until the lack of air is causing him more discomfort than his feelings. 

He gets out of bed, thinking to himself distractedly that he at least managed to sleep through the night this time. Between going to bed at four in the morning and now, he must have gotten a full six hours of sleep. Thirteen hours over two nights is definitely the sort of thing that counts as a record when six had been the most he had managed over the same span of time for the past ten days.

Sometimes, when he feels like it, Patrick makes spreadsheets with his sleeping patterns, just so he can play around with the numbers. It lets him adjust his expectations accordingly, and calculate useless statistics that won’t change anything about all the sleep he’s missing out on.

His head is pounding in the most uncomfortable way this morning, though, which Patrick blames on the alcohol. It makes standing harder than Patrick would like it to be, and he has to force himself to pad into the kitchen and make himself coffee, before digging through his tragically empty pantry. When he finds nothing, he sighs, rubbing his face. He’ll have to stop by a Starbucks on the way to work if he wants to not starve. Or maybe just go to Starbucks and come back home. Someone should tell DiFronzo that even mobsters deserve days off sometimes. Not Patrick, but someone.

Moaning curses into the empty apartment, Patrick drags himself into his shower and brushes his teeth in hope of getting the aftertaste of vodka off his tongue. It’s late, much later than Patrick would usually allow himself to get up, but when he checks his phone, there are no messages from Jason telling him to get into office “now, Patrick”. Instead, there’s Temi complaining about his hangover, and Shawsy sending him a series of sobbing face emojis because there’s only the event management team at the Showtime offices. Patrick just sends Shawsy a poop emoji in response, because he’s classy like that.

When Patrick’s phone buzzes the next time, it’s not an answer from Shawsy or Temi but an unknown number. With the message previews deactivated on his phone – Patrick doesn’t tempt chance like that – there’s no way of knowing whether it’s some marketing company or someone important. Patrick crosses his fingers for marketing company. People that have to do with work that he doesn’t already have saved in his contacts sending him messages on his personal phone is usually a bad sign, and Patrick’s head hurts too much to deal with that right now.

It’s neither, though. It’s a picture. A picture of someone’s toned stomach, pearly white streaks of come painting it more artfully than should be fair. Under soft, glowing skin, peeks a teasing shadow of pubic hair that makes Patrick’s mouth go dry. It’s not quite a dick pick, but there’s also no doubt about the intention behind the picture. Patrick stares. Jesus, is Jonny hot. It’s like he’s trying to work down Patrick’s resistances while they’re still low.

Patrick chokes out a laugh. Jonny really shouldn’t be this good at manipulating techniques. Patrick should probably consider whether he works for another mob in Chicago and is trying to bring on Patrick’s downfall.

 _Told you I’d be thinking about you_ , the message reads.

The memory is a little fuzzy at the edges, but Patrick distinctly remembers Jonny talking about jerking off to the memory of Patrick’s cock, so he supposes that Jonny did in fact keep his promise. Even in the light of day, it feels like the filthiest thing anyone has ever told him that Patrick is also into. He has to press the heel of his hand against his crotch, staring at the picture like it will tell him whether he should just jerk off to it right now or go to lick the come off Jonny’s stomach right this second.

He wonders if Jonny has any breakfast at home, and if Patrick could justify coming over that way. If Jonny would be up for a second round right after jerking off. He thumbs over the hardening line of his cock.

_[To: unknown number]_

_Fuck u_

_Want me t come over?_

There’s no rational way to justify what Patrick is doing right now, so he doesn’t even try. Thinking about this hasn’t stopped him from breaking the rules up until now. Patrick wants to see Jonny as much as he wants to get out of this condo, and as long as nobody tells him that he’s needed at work, he’ll prefer the Jonny option to spending the day at his office.

Jonny takes barely a second to answer Patrick’s message.

_[From: unknown number]_

_Yes._

_For breakfast too, if you want._

As if to put its stamp of approval on the idea, Patrick’s stomach chooses that moment to rumble pathetically. He snorts at the empty room.

Then, he wanders to the closest mirror. Having had no plans to leave the condo for more than Starbucks this morning, he’s only wearing a soft tee and sweatpants, hair messy instead of slicked back like it is when Patrick has to work. It’s hard to tell whether Jonny is going to find him more fuckable dressed like that, or if he made a semblance of effort. After all, Jonny has been into Patrick in all the outfits Patrick has worn around him up until now. It’s a damn tragedy.

In the end, Patrick changes out of his sweatpants into some clean jeans, snags a baseball cap from a chair, and makes his way out of the door.

In the car, he concentrates on small objectives instead of letting himself ponder just how much of an idiot this entire thing makes him. He stops at Starbucks to get some cookies and two large coffees – with soy milk for Jonny, because Jonny had appreciated that last time as well – and then drives the rest of the way feeling somewhere between hungry and horny, the smell of melting chocolate filling the Hummer.

As soon as he’s at Jonny’s place, he rings the doorbell, presenting both coffees in front of him, the cookies stuck in a paper bag under his elbow.

“Hey,” Jonny says, opening the door with a grin.

Patrick stares. Jonny is only wearing a flimsy tank top and boxer briefs, showing off more skin than what should be authorised anywhere outside of the privacy of his home. If he shifted to the side even slightly, Patrick would be able to see his nipples. And high up on his neck, under his right ear, there’s a purple bruise that Patrick must have left there yesterday. A wave of heat crashes over him. Patrick hasn’t had the chance to see Jonny fully naked yet, but right now, he’s getting a sense that that might be on the program for today.

“Can you read minds?” Jonny asks, seemingly perfectly at ease with Patrick’s eyes on him, or the possibility of a neighbour walking by. “TJ the dick took all the coffee he made with him when he left.”

Patrick’s eyes flicker to the coffee tray in his hands, before he grins back at Jonny. He shakes his head ever-so-slightly and shoulders past Jonny into the apartment, pushes the door closed behind him. In the privacy of Jonny’s hallway, he gives Jonny another once-over and wolf-whistles, eyes halting where Jonny’s massive thighs are spilling from his boxers.

“Coast is clear, then?” he asks, because that’s definitely relevant information in what Jonny just said.

He holds out the soy milk coffee to Jonny, who takes it gratefully.

“Thanks.” Jonny checks the label, probably to make sure Patrick got it right, and Patrick raises one eyebrow sufficiently, because hey, he pays attention. “And yeah.” He looks back up at Patrick, smirking. “It’s just us.”

Except that he doesn’t try anything, not right away. Instead, he turns on his heels and leads Patrick into the small kitchen, gesturing for Patrick to sit at the table. Patrick obliges, putting down his coffee and the cookies. He guesses that drinking the coffee while it’s hot does have its advantages.

Jonny starts peering into the cabinets, so Patrick allows himself to just admire Jonny’s ass, and how nicely the briefs show it off. It’s big, rounded so perfectly that it looks a little surreal, and the black briefs emphasise the crease between ass and thighs. Jonny could probably suffocate a man with that ass, but Patrick bets that that man would die happy. The fact that Patrick still hasn’t gotten to get his hands on it yet is a crime against humanity. Hopefully, Jonny liking to get stared at means that he won’t mind getting touched there either.

“We have oatmeal and fruit loops,” Jonny says, turning back towards him. “And fruits and eggs. Take your pick.”

“I got cookies too,” Patrick says, lifting the cookie bag demonstratively before taking a sip from his coffee.

“Oh. That's nice,” Jonny says, eyeing the cookies, but his smile is apologetic, and Patrick can see the “but” coming from miles away. Jonny rubs his neck. “I don't think I can eat them though. My digestive system is kind of a bitch, meaning I can't eat anything containing dairy or gluten. So I'm-“ he gestures to the cupboards, “kind of restricted in my choice.”

“Ah,” Patrick says. “That explains that.”

He nods towards Jonny’s coffee, which he hadn’t yet gotten around to asking about. Some people just like soy milk – weird people exist. Patrick doesn’t judge or anything. Allergies sound like a bitch, though, especially when it’s the gluten too. Turns out that Patrick can’t get everything right without forewarning after all. He eyes the cookies sadly, before shrugging and flashing Jonny his dimples.

“More for me, then.”

“It is what it is,” Jonny says, answering Patrick’s shrug.

He turns back towards the counter to make himself a bowl of oatmeal and fruit, while Patrick nibbles on one of the cookies that has already cooled down noticeably.

After a moment of consideration, Patrick takes off the lid of his cup and dunks the cookie inside his cookie. It makes the cookies feel mushy in his mouth, but there’s also some foam from the milk, and it makes the chocolate melt on his tongue, so he moans appreciatively. The look that Jonny gives him over his shoulder makes Patrick grin around the cookie. He bites off a bit and makes a show of licking whatever crumbs there might be left on his mouth off. Jonny laughs softly.

He comes to sit down at the table with Patrick, then, bowl in hand. Immediately, he presses one naked leg against Patrick’s jeans, like a point of heat that catches all of Patrick’s attention for one moment.

“So, I take it no work today?” Jonny asks casually. “Or are we on a clock?”

He takes a sip from his own coffee, and hums in satisfaction. It’s cute. Patrick imitates him, so his cup hides how silly his smile has to be. There’s something about Jonny that just makes Patrick happy, as long as he’ll allow himself. It makes him feel foolish, but also kind of warm inside.

“I don't have real work hours,” Patrick says from behind his cup. “There's no security gig planned today, and I was gonna take the morning off anyway, for what's left of it.” After taking another sip, he puts the cup down. He taps his fingers against his temple. “I'm not gonna be very effective right this moment anyway. Calculating stuff. What about you? Don't you have like, classes sometimes?”

“It’s Sunday,” Jonny says, giving Patrick a look that is best summarised as _duh_. “And my semester is over anyway.”

Patrick lets out a laugh. “Whoops. Right. Sundays are a thing that people do. I’d forgotten there for a second. Congrats for it being summer holidays, then, though.”

Jonny hums patronisingly, but he also rubs his foot against the inside of Patrick’s calf, sliding lower into his seat as he shovels a spoon of oatmeal into his mouth. Patrick stomach does a somersault.

Then Jonny asks about Ty.

“I've been wondering, you know,” he starts, pulling the spoon out of his mouth. “You and Segs, back in first year, you two, were you-“ He hesitates for a moment before asking. “Were you guys dating or just fuckbuddies?” He pauses. “You don't have to answer though.”

It’s like a bucket of cold water getting dumped over Patrick’s head. It’s the second time now, that they’re talking about Ty, and Patrick still isn’t prepared for it, because people knowing things about his personal life that are actually true, actually mattered- That doesn’t happen. His closest friend at work can’t even remember what city he is from, and the person who knows the most about him is his boss, who only ever uses that information if he thinks it could be a strategic advantage. Which isn’t often.

Patrick isn’t going to falter like last time, though, so he pulls himself together quickly and gives Jonny a wry smile.

“Are you doubting my claim that I’m straight?” he asks. “Because I don’t see what I could possibly have done to lead you to this kind of conclusion.” He taps his fingers against his cup, raises it to take a sip. For a moment, he ponders whether he should try to avoid the question entirely, but then sighs. “We were dating. Didn’t end well for him. Anyway, I don’t do that anymore. Date guys.” He tips his cup in Jonny’s direction mockingly. “Or fuck them.”

“You don’t, huh?” Jonny asks, continuing to run his foot up and down the inside of Pat's calf.

Patrick gives him a smile like _whatcha gonna do_. It fits with Patrick’s made-up backstory, but it’s not like it’s a complete lie either. What he’s doing here is breaking every rule.

“Just because you aren't straight doesn't mean you are gay,” Jonny points out. “You could be bi, like TJ.”

He shrugs a little, letting his foot wander up a little bit higher. Patrick widens his knees to make room for Jonny’s foot, a shiver going up his spine.

“Uh-huh,” Patrick says.

Yeah, you could be bi. Patrick isn’t, but hey, that’s not Jonny’s fault. Patrick’s excuse for pretending to be straight just involves a lot of denial and parental pressure. Patrick is a little proud of how dramatic it is, really, and part of him hopes he’ll get to test it on Jonny eventually. For now, though, the seriousness of the conversation seems to be dissolving in favour of something else entirely. Like Jonny’s foot on Patrick’s leg.

“Either way, I'm glad you picked up the phone,” Jonny adds with a shrug.

“Well, you did say it yourself, they always come back for more.” Patrick bites off a piece of his cookie. “You’re a magic witch, or something. Couldn’t resist. Honestly, I don’t know how TJ manages to live with you and not want to bang you like a drum when you walk around like this.”

“The only way TJ would still want to bang me was if I agreed to a threesome with him and Lauren,” Jonny says, smiling. Patrick notes the “still”. He’s irrationally glad that that seems to be over. “He’s so gone for her, he wants to get her name tattooed on his chest.”

“Oh my god,” Patrick says, half-scandalised. “How much bad taste can one person have? Everyone knows that you don’t _do_ that.”

“I know,” Jonny says with a small laugh. “But I guess we all have terrible ideas we still want to act on.”

His gaze is pointed, and Patrick laughs, because ouch. That one was definitely aimed at him, and it’s more than a little deserved.

“Anyway, I only put the shirt on for you,” Jonny continues, slipping his foot a little higher, sliding it along he inseam of Patrick’s jeans, past his knee and halfway up his thigh. He looks at Patrick, eyes focused. “Didn’t want to freak you out by opening the door in just briefs.”

“But what would the neighbours think?” Patrick asks, mouth dry.

They both know why he’s here, so really, Jonny not wearing clothes shouldn’t have been an issue at all. Not that what he’s wearing now really counts as clothes. Patrick wonders if you can see whether Jonny’s hard through the briefs. The table is hiding the view from him, which, frankly, is a shame. He drags the tip of his tongue across his lips quickly, remembering how nice Jonny’s cock had felt on his tongue, just under ten hours ago.

Eyes dropping to Patrick’s mouth, Jonny inches his way up higher until finally his foot comes to rest on Patrick’s crotch. Patrick lets out a shaky breath. Jonny presses down slightly, splaying his toes. Fuck, a footjob isn’t what Patrick had expected when showing up here, but he’ll so, so take it.

“I’d hope they think that they like what they see,” Jonny answers Patrick’s question, taking another sip from his coffee, while gently rubbing his foot up and down Patrick’s hard-on.

“Well, I think we’ve established that they would,” Patrick says, breath hitching ever-so-slightly. “Is that something you like? Being looked at?” He lets his eyes roam over Jonny’s shoulders, his chest, licks his lips. “That why you like to fuck guys outside? So there’s a chance you’ll get caught?”

Jonny watches Patrick watching him, and it’s easy to tell the answer to Patrick’s question before Jonny even opens his mouth, just from how his cheeks pinken up, how his breathing quickens under Patrick’s gaze.

“Yeah,” Jonny says, pressing a little harder down on Patrick’s erection before resuming his rubbing motion. “Yeah, I like it. I like being looked at.”  Patrick’s eyelids flutter shut despite himself before he catches himself. He _wants_ to look. Jonny’s eyes are dark on him, focussed, and he’s the hottest thing Patrick has ever seen. “That’s why I took the picture, I wanted you to look at me. And I wanted you to like it. Because that makes it so much better.”

Jason likes to joke about how Patrick hates being naked so much that he needs someone to tell him to undress before going into the shower. It doesn’t stop him from getting Patrick undressed whenever he can.

With Jonny, though, Patrick can only be fascinated. He doesn’t understand the appeal of presenting yourself to the world like this, and it only makes watching Jonny, watching the naked skin Jonny puts on display for him, all the more thrilling. There’s something forbidden about it, something beautiful. Patrick chews on his bottom lip furiously, yearning for skin to put his mouth on. His cock is straining under the pressure of Jonny’s foot, heart thrumming in his chest with want, because it’s not just how Jonny looks, how Jonny is touching him, but his words too.

“I like looking at you,” Patrick says honestly. He tilts his head slightly to the side, smiles cheekily. “Do you wanna take your shirt off for me, Jonny?”

Jonny looks at him for a moment, foot stilling on Patrick’s cock before he straightens up to pull his tank top over his head. He resumes the footjob, then, in small circles against Patrick’s cock that demand increasing restraint from Patrick so as not to hitch his hips forward, into the pressure. Patrick’s eyes roam Jonny’s naked chest, and his first thought is that there is the full scar he’d only seen a sneak peak of the last time he’d been here.

There’s more than one scar, even – the biggest spanning all the way from Jonny’s collarbone down to his sternum in a straight line, and two at Jonny’s sides starting under his arms towards his back. Faded against tan skin, but drawing the eye nevertheless. They’re surgical scars, Patrick thinks, and he can’t help but be curious about them. He won’t ask, not when those are the type of questions that tend to lead to a “what about you?”, because then he’d have to come up with an explanation for the gunshot scar on his right clavicle, but his eyes follow the span of them anyway.

Quickly, though, the scars fly from his list of immediate concerns, because Jonny isn’t just done with his shirt being off. Eyes intent on Patrick, lips slightly parted, he lets the hand that had been resting against his neck, over the hickey, travel down over his collarbone, down his chest, brushing over one nipple, reaching his abs and then going even lower, disappearing under the table. Touching himself, there’s no doubt. Patrick’s eyes feel like they’re glued to the stretch of skin where his line of vision gets cut off by the table, wishing that he could see.

“Fucking hell, Jonny,” he says. His voice feels scratchy, from the arousal, from how much he needs to touch Jonny, or maybe come just from this, with Jonny’s foot against his cock and Jonny doing a fucking strip tease for him. “You’re beautiful. You’re so fucking beautiful.”

Jonny moans, arm flexing as he presumably palms himself, and he lets his head drop back for a moment, exposing the long, golden line of his throat. Patrick wants to eat him.

“Do you want me to come like this?” he asks, fist tightening against his thigh as he wills himself not to move. The _because I’m gonna if you keep going_ , goes unspoken. “I can suck you off after.” He licks his lips. “I’ll make it good, you know I will. Tell me what you want, Jonny.”

Jonny drops his foot out of Patrick’s crotch abruptly, and Patrick’s hips hitch forward at the loss, instinctively, craving more touch. Instead, though, Jonny stands up and rounds the table, finally giving Patrick an eyeful of his cock, covered only by a pair of black boxer briefs that do nothing to hide how hard he is. Just the sight of it makes Patrick’s mouth water.

He wants to kiss Jonny when he reaches out to take his hand, pull him up, but Jonny’s grip is decided as he takes Patrick to the bedroom. Patrick lets him lead the way, watching Jonny’s back instead, his ass, until they’re in Jonny’s room and Jonny strips entirely, shamelessly. He drops his clothes on the ground, next to a pile of discarded shirts, a potted plant, and a guitar that’s leaning against the wall, because of course Jonny’s bedroom is messy.

“I want you,” he says, like it’s that simple, before grabbing Patrick’s face to crash their mouths together, knocking his snapback off in the process.

Patrick’s entire body sings with it. He has to tilt his head up to kiss Jonny, but that’s barely even a thought anymore. He likes it, how tall and muscular Jonny is, how youthful he looks all the same, all smooth skin and soft lines amidst the hardness of muscle. Jonny’s cock is hard too, pressing into Patrick’s stomach, and Patrick rocks his hips forward as he kisses Jonny back, hot and desperate. His hands roam Jonny’s back, squeeze at the muscle there.

He wants to reach down and squeeze Jonny’s ass too, but he doesn’t quite dare to, bites down on Jonny’s lower lip instead and rubs off against his thigh, a mirror of last night at the bar. Except that it’s different, because Jonny’s naked now, and they’re both clean and sober, drunk only on arousal.

He switches over to small, butterfly kisses, away from Jonny’s mouth and down his jaw, bites at the hickey under his ear that’s still there from Patrick’s own mouth having been there, less than half a day ago. With his thumb, he traces down Jonny’s chest, from his collarbone to his sternum, along the scar, and then down, down, over his stomach, until his hand is flirting with Jonny’s pubes. The left hand is light on the small of Jonny’s back, holding him there but not wanting to press the brace uncomfortably into his skin. His lips latch onto Jonny’s ear, and he sucks on the lobe instead, senses wide open for signs of Jonny liking this, chasing after the sounds, the moans that escape Jonny’s lips.

“You can touch me,” Jonny pants, tilting his head to give Patrick better access to his neck. “Anywhere. You want to?”

Then he kisses Patrick, teeth tugging at Patrick’s bottom lip, before stepping back, bringing distance between them so he can climb onto the bed and prop himself up on his elbows, legs spread invitingly. His cock is full and leaking, curving towards his belly, and everything about the way he looks is pure filth.

Patrick laughs breathlessly. “I think we’ve established that.”

Still, he has to stop to just admire him for a second, whether Jonny invited him to touch or not. Just the way Jonny looks, open and inviting, not an ounce of shame present in his body, makes Patrick feel like he’s drunk again after all.

Only then does he kneel between Jonny’s open legs, running both hands along the inside of Jonny’s thighs reverently. He’s not entirely sure if Jonny wants something specific from him, but he figures that if he gets his mouth on every bit of available skin, he should get where Jonny wants him eventually. So he bends down, kisses the inside of Jonny’s knee, then up his thigh, biting and licking, until he’s sucking a second hickey into the dip of Jonny’s hip.

He really hopes that Jonny doesn’t mind the hickeys. Patrick hasn’t actually asked. Hopefully, Jonny would tell him if he doesn’t like it, but- Patrick looks back up at Jonny, where he’s spread out in front of him. The spot he’d been sucking on is already blooming red.

“Sorry I’m- Do you mind? The hickeys? I know I already-“ He gestures towards his own neck, around the spot where he marked up Jonny last night.

“No, I don’t mind them,” Jonny laughs breathlessly.

Patrick grins, licking his lips, and immediately dives back down to suck a second hickey into the crease of Jonny’s hip- Except that Jonny seems to have other plans. He grabs a handful of Patrick’s hair, tugging lightly, but firmly, until Patrick gets the memo and crawls up Jonny’s body to kiss his mouth instead. He goes hungrily, kissing Jonny with burning lips. He loves it, how warm and tingly his mouth feels from working it against Jonny’s skin, and it makes it even better when Jonny’s tongue slides across them.

“I really fucking like it,” Jonny whispers, biting Patrick’s bottom lip, his hands still in Patrick’s hair as he bucks up his hips, grinding his cock against Patrick’s, with only Patrick’s clothes there to separate them. “Do you mind when I tug your hair?”

It’s cute that Jonny is asking again, when this is something they’ve already been over. Maybe Patrick’s consent hadn’t been enthusiastic enough last time to fully convince him. Patrick hums, kissing Jonny once more before he lifts himself up on his elbows a little, keeping his weight more effectively from Jonny so he doesn’t crush him. Just because Jonny is taller doesn’t mean Patrick is all that much lighter, since Patrick effectively has more than a few pounds of pure muscle mass on Jonny.

Patrick kisses him hungrily, dipping his head so he can taste Jonny’s mouth, feel Jonny move against him in return, and Jonny meets him right there. Jonny lets one hand slip from Patrick’s hair, down his back, tracing the line off his spine, before going back up, palm flat between his shoulder blades. Patrick has to part for air, more than so than he parts to answer.

“Yes,” he says, still, leaning down to kiss the corner of Jonny’s mouth. “Yeah, I told you. Pull on my hair, do anything you want.” He kisses Jonny again, longer his time. Then, he grins ever-so-slightly. “Just don’t call me names.”

“I won’t, I promise,” Jonny whispers, tugging slightly at Patrick’s hair to get him to tilt his head, allowing Jonny to lick and kiss at his neck. Patrick lets out a silent moan. “Calling people names isn’t really my thing.”

Jonny lets his hands travel up and down Patrick’s sides, brushing over the thin fabric of his shirt, tugging on it occasionally before eventually gripping the hem, as Patrick dives back in to capture Jonny’s lips. Patrick’s hips roll forward to grind against Jonny’s cock.

“Wanna get naked too?” Jonny asks when they separate the next time, grinning a little. “Or is this how we’re gonna do it?”

For emphasis he wraps his legs around Patrick, effectively closing him in. It gets perfect friction on both of their cocks, causing Patrick to groan against Jonny’s throat. Jonny’s trapping him between his legs, though, and for a fleeting moment, it makes Patrick wonder what it would be like to fuck Jonny. Actually, literally fucking him. With Jonny’s legs wrapped around his hips maybe, and Jonny’s fingers in his hair, and- He makes a noise at the back of his throat, and then he’s kissing Jonny, pressing him hard into the mattress and pinning one of his wrists with his right hand.

He rocks his hips against Jonny, spreads his own knees wider for more space, and fuck, he knows the question was about clothes, and he should be asking Jonny what’s more comfortable for him, but he’s sort of having a moment. With his imagination.

“Yeah,” Jonny groans, squeezing his legs tighter around Patrick. “Okay, okay. Fuck- Pat. Yeah. Like that.”

Jonny’s response is beautiful, like he’s just as into the idea as Patrick is, knees tightening around Patrick’s waist and encouraging him with heartfelt cursing. Patrick just has to kiss him more, drop fiery kisses on his mouth, feeling Jonny strain under his hold. He lets go of Jonny’s wrist, not wanting to stop him from moving if he wants to, and he’s so distracted by Jonny’s naked body, Jonny’s mouth, Jonny’s legs around him, that he nearly kisses Jonny’s words away, nearly misses them.

“I’ve got lube,” Jonny gets out between kisses, mouthing at Patrick’s jaw. “In my drawer. And condoms. If you want to-” He grins a little, tugging at Patrick’s hair to have him look at Jonny. “If you want to fuck me.”

Patrick stills, blinking at him owlishly. Yes, of course he _wants_ to, but he’d never thought- Jonny’s taller than him, older too, likes to pull at Patrick’s hair, and sure, he doesn’t put Patrick down, but Patrick still hadn’t been expecting this. He’s pretty sure that’s not how things work. And while Patrick would honestly much rather get blown than fucked, he’d still thought that this was what they were aiming towards, if there’s a long run to speak of.

“You want to be fucked?” he asks, careful and confused. Jonny’s dick is hard and straining against his stomach, and Patrick gives a small roll of his hips, not quite managing to still himself. “You’re- by me?”

Fuck, Patrick has never actually fucked a guy. He knows anal, more than just a little, has fingering down to as much of an art as jerking off, but it’s always been on himself. He’s pretty sure that if he tries to put his dick in Jonny’s ass he’ll just end up coming instantly. He really can’t imagine how he’s supposed to hold out if he gets in _that_.

From the look in Jonny’s face, it’s not the right thing to ask. A flurry of emotions pass over Jonny’s face, halting on embarrassment and vulnerability. Like he thinks that Patrick asking is a rejection all on its own. Patrick has no idea what to think. He hadn’t even considered-

“I mean, yeah,” Jonny says hesitantly. “Unless you don’t want to. I mean, that’s-” He gives Patrick a wry smile. “That’s fine too. We can do whatever you want. I’m- Flexible. So.” He awkwardly tugs at Pat’s shirt, eyes searching. “What do _you_ want to do?” he asks, pressing a kiss to Patrick’s slightly parted lips, reaching up to cup his jaw, stroking his thumb over the smooth skin there.

“I wanna fuck you,” Patrick says truthfully, looking at Jonny unsurely. “I’m- sorry for asking? I didn’t think you’d want me to. I’m just-“

He shakes his head, cutting himself off. At the end of the day, Patrick doesn’t know anything. He has no proper dating experience, no idea how gay guys work these things out between them. Maybe there’s a sort of instinct there about who fucks who that Patrick doesn’t have. Patrick just needs to shift his expectations right now.

“Hey no,” Jonny says quickly, bringing their lips together for another kiss, and another. “Pat, it’s okay. You are allowed to ask shit, yeah?”

He smiles, pressing a kiss to the corner of Patrick’s mouth, then his jawline and his neck. Patrick tilts his head to give him better access, shivering. Maybe they’re good after all. It’s hard to feel awkward with Jonny’s mouth so close to his skin.

“I mean, I asked you too, if you wanted to,” Jonny continues, running his hand from Patrick’s shoulder blade down to his waist and back up. “Because I know that people often expect me to top. It’s- You were so surprised. Like you couldn’t imagine wanting to fuck me.” He gives Patrick a small shrug, accompanied by a smile that makes Patrick’s insides feel weak. “But you do, so…” He licks his lips, bringing one hand into Patrick’s hair to tug his head down for a kiss that grows more heated than sweet this time while Jonny rolls his hips upwards, against Patrick.

The moment of unease they’ve had hasn’t been enough for either of their arousals to go away, and the pressure just makes the sparks fly up Patrick’s spine again as he groans helplessly, from Jonny’s words again, and the way he’s kissing Patrick like he needs to ease him back into it. Patrick gives back as good as he can, tongue sliding into Jonny’s mouth, biting a little, until Jonny’s tugs his head back again to mouthe at Patrick’s jaw instead.

“So, if you want to, and I want to,” he whispers, breath tickling against Patrick’s skin. “Then let’s do it, eh? Because I really, fucking want you to. I’ve been thinking about you fucking me when I jerked off this morning. I was too lazy to finger myself or do anything about it, but, Pat.” He grins a little. “I would have let you bend me over the sink in that restroom yesterday.”

“Oh god,” Patrick says, voice embarrassingly high-pitched, and dives back down to kiss Jonny’s mouth, try and ground himself.

He can’t even _think_ about how Jonny just said he likes to finger himself, how hot that is. Making out is good, especially with Jonny, and he just does that for a while, pressing Jonny into the mattress and practically tongue-fucking his mouth, but he’s also turned on beyond belief and soon, he’s thrusting up against Jonny’s cock again, in small, instinctive thrusts, until he has to still himself again if he doesn’t want to just end up coming in his pants.

He sits up on his heels, peeling away from Jonny, and his eyes roam Jonny’s body again, because Jesus, is he a sight. Flushed and so visibly turned on, precome shiny on his stomach, with his mouth a burning red mess and his pupils blown wide open. Patrick did that. He made Jonny look like that. A swell of pride and want tightens in his gut, and he runs both hands down Jonny’s chest just so he can feel. When his hands ghost over Jonny’s nipples, he halts there too, thumbs at one of them with his right hand, fascinated.

Jonny gives Pat a nod, reaching for his arm, running his hand up and down the inked sleeve.

“You want to play with my nipples?” he asks, looking up at Patrick. “Because you can, but not for too long if you want to get to fuck me before I come.”

“I-“

Patrick looks back at Jonny’s face, eyes blown open with lust. The fact that Jonny gets hot from getting his nipples touched feels like yet another attempt from Jonny at proving just how hot he is. And Patrick might not want Jonny to come from it, but- He sort of does. Want to see that. He definitely has to see if Jonny’s being honest when he’s talking about getting turned on from it. If it makes it harder for Jonny to last, then that’s probably better anyway, because Patrick still thinks he’s going to come the second he tries to fuck Jonny. Maybe he can just pre-emptively get Jonny close enough that it won’t matter.

In the grand scheme of things, it’s strange that so many things have only been done _to_ him. It’s even weirder when Patrick’s never really been into any of it, and yet the thought of doing it to Jonny is turning him on so much. Nipple play, fucking, rimming even. He’d love to get his mouth on Jonny’s ass. But then he guesses that it’s not so much that he’s hated the acts themselves, and more linked to the person doing them. Patrick’s been convinced that he’d like Jonny fucking him, after all.

It’s too much thinking, though, and Patrick stills his fingers where they’re teasing along the edge of Jonny’s nipple. He looks back up at Jonny and grins a little.

“Don’t come, then,” he says.

Then he’s leaning down to latch his mouth on one of Jonny’s nipples and suck on it. Softly, at first, exploring the little nub, before trying to bite – not hard, just to test Jonny’s reactions. He licks around the edge, flicks the nub with his tongue, teases the other one with his free thumb.

“Oh fuck,” Jonny gasps, writhing under Patrick’s mouth. “Pat-“

His back arches into Patrick’s touch, fingers finding Patrick’s hair to hold him closer. Patrick is only too happy to oblige. He moves on to Jonny’s right nipple once he’s satisfied, quickly replacing his mouth with his fingers on the left one. It’s still wet from Patrick’s spit, hard and probably sensitive, and Patrick flicks it at the same time as he nibbles on Jonny’s right nipple, just to hear the keen that goes through Jonny.

His scalp is tingling pleasantly from how much Jonny has been pulling at it by now, and it’s shooting straight to his dick. He can barely believe his eyes at how responsive Jonny is, how genuine it seems when he moans and bucks up against Patrick with every flick of Patrick’s tongue on his nipple. He’d shown more restraint when Patrick had been sucking his cock, which might have been out of politeness, but still shows how much Jonny is into this.

“Your mouth,” Jonny moans. “Fucking magic.”

Patrick grins. Jonny liking what Patrick does with his mouth is great, because Patrick wants to put his mouth on Jonny a lot.

“You’re so hot, baby,” he says, flicks his tongue over the bud of Jonny’s nipple again. Then he sits back up, runs his uninjured hand down over Jonny’s stomach, before wrapping it around Jonny’s dick. “Gonna fuck you now,” he announces, and there’s still a hint of question in his voice, because he wants Jonny to be _sure_ that’s what he wants from Patrick, because it feels so surreal.

He tightens his fist around Jonny’s cock, gives him a few pulls, that have Jonny’s hip buck forward on the bed. Jonny looks so completely debauched like this, spread out on the bed, _legs_ spread, ready for Patrick to just take whatever he wants. Or, well, as long as he’s got Jonny’s permission for it, but as it turns out, their wants seem to align really fucking well.

“Yes, please,” Jonny breathes.

He twists, reaching across the bed to get out lube and a condom, pressing the bottle into Patrick’s hand, that Patrick uncaps immediately, letting go of Jonny’s cock. He’s pretty familiar with the process, so he doesn’t really have to think all that much about how much lube he wants to pour on his fingers. It’s different, though, when he looks at Jonny, and thinks that he’s going to have to go by what _Jonny_ likes here.

“Can you flip for me?” he asks, running his free hand – the one with the brace – over the top of Jonny’s thigh.

He wants to be able to see what he’s doing, here. And Jonny’s backside is gorgeous, so it’s not like the view will be any worse than his front.

Jonny turns over without needing to be asked twice, and Patrick feels it like a punch to the gut, the way he’s offering himself up for Patrick. He shifts back so he’s kneeling comfortably between Jonny’s legs, and leans down to kiss Jonny’s tailbone, before slipping two lubed up fingers right between his cheeks, mostly rubbing the lube off on and around his hole. When he does it himself, he knows where to go right away, but he’s realising that if he wants to explore more with Jonny, he should probably have accounted for that and poured out the lube later.

Gently, he parts Jonny’s cheeks to bare his hole, rubs the pad of his thumb against it. It makes his eyes feel like they’re burning. It’s so private, in a way, seeing someone there, _touching_ them. Part of it is intimidating, even, because Patrick really, really wants to do well. He wants Jonny to get off on Patrick touching him, Patrick fucking him. Bad sex is something he’s familiar with, and Jonny deserves more than that.

“I’m assuming you’ve been told before how awesome your ass is?” he asks, rubbing his thumb around Jonny’s hole, just to watch it flutter. He presses the tip of his thumb in, ever-so-slightly. “Really distracting.”

“I've been told, yeah,” Jonny breathes. “You an ass or tits kinda guy, Pat?”

Patrick slips his thumb out and goes for an index instead, unsure of how fast he can go with fingers here. He gets fucked regularly enough that he doesn’t need all that much prep, usually, but he doesn’t know how things are for Jonny. Especially since apparently, he sometimes fingers himself when he jerks off. Which is so hot that Patrick really wants to see Jonny do it. Given that Jonny likes being watched, it’d be a win-win.

When he presses his finger inside, the tight heat that surrounds his finger makes his cock throb with want. He’s not going to survive that much pressure on his dick. It’s different from doing himself, that’s for sure, and he wonders if that makes it exciting for Jonny, the fact that he’s not the one controlling Patrick’s movements. Patrick slides his finger in slowly, feels the slight resistance around each knuckle, takes his time to just watch it disappear and come back out. He’s too distracted to answer Jonny’s question for a moment, but then he snorts.

“Ass,” he says laconically.

He’s gay, it’s not a difficult question. Tits really don’t do it for him. He can see the appeal, aesthetically speaking, but he doesn’t feel turned on by them. They’re fun to squeeze, he guesses, but then asses offer that luxury too.

“Yeah? That’s good, because I got no tits, sorry,” Jonny says breathily, sliding a hand under himself like he’s considering touching himself.

“Wouldn’t want any.”

The brace makes it difficult to do things left-handed, so Patrick has to pull out his finger to pour more lube onto his hand. He warms it up between his fingers quickly, and then he’s sliding in two fingers, making sure not to go too fast, but scissoring them in and out in a way that he knows will get the muscle to relax. Jonny makes an impatient noise, hips hitching back like he wants Patrick to go harder already.

He squeezes around Patrick’s fingers, too, so Patrick finally takes pity on him and goes on the search for Jonny’s prostate. It takes him a couple crooks of his fingers, but when he does find the slight irregularity under the cup of his finger, it makes Jonny’s muscles clench beautifully, entire back rippling along with the moan that escapes his lips, and Patrick grins.

“Gotcha,” he says. He presses both fingers against it. “So.” He circles his fingers around it, pulls out a bit, slides them back in. “You do this often? Finger yourself? Cause honestly that’s super hot.”

“Do that again, Pat,” Jonny groans, pushing himself back onto Patrick’s fingers, unashamed. He lifts himself up until he’s on all fours, knees spread wide and ass on display for Patrick. “C’mon. I- I do. I like it, I’m-” He lets out a breathless little laugh. “I’m really into it. Ass play.”

Patrick’s breath hitches at the sight of Jonny pushing himself up like that, not just passively lying there but on all fours, in a position that Patrick knows to feel a lot more vulnerable. It’s really fucking hot. But then he guesses that it’s been established that pretty much anything Jonny has been doing is hot. Even the laughing and talking about how much he likes it. Patrick honestly can’t believe that he gets to be here and finger him open like this. It’s like his little gay boy’s dreams come true, and about as religious an experience as when he’d sucked Ty’s cock for the first time.

It’s easy to forget just how fucking gay he is when the sex he has on the regular doesn’t really cut it for him. But this, this is the shit. Patrick feels so fucking lucky to be here. Tries not to think of all the reasons why he might not be so smart in this, because he’s got two fingers up Jonny’s gorgeous ass, and he’s going to get to put his dick in there. He’s on top of the world and he’s going to enjoy the high while it last. The only reason he hasn’t already gotten his dick out at this point is because he doesn’t want it to be over.

“Think you’re ready for a third?” he asks. He doesn’t wait for an answer before, slipping Jonny the third easily. Jonny gasps, flush now spreading all the way down his back. “Mh, you are,” Patrick hums, scissoring his fingers in and out. “Got you relaxed enough for my dick, even?”

He taps the fingers of his injured hand against Jonny’s ass cheek. Watches the fingers of the other one, and how it seems to disappear inside Jonny. He’s a little calmer than before, which is good and might actually prevent instant ejaculation, but hey. It’s better if Jonny’s already close anyway. He crooks his fingers against Jonny’s prostate, again, and again. Jonny’s tensing everywhere, moaning, and it makes Patrick want to see whether his dick is leaking where it’s bobbing between his legs, where Jonny reaches to tug on his dick, only holding himself up on one arm.

“Watcha think, Jonny?” Patrick asks, before leaning in to get his face close, give Jonny’s taint a long, broad lick, just as Jonny says that yes, yes he’s ready.

Jonny’s arm just buckles under him. He crashes down on the mattress, ass still up in the air with Patrick’s fingers buried deep inside him, like Patrick’s mouth on him on top of everything else is just too much to handle.

“Fuck me already,” he gasps into the pillow, before managing to get his arms back under him. “I wanna come with you in me, so you better get that beautiful cock in me, alright?”

“Jesus,” Patrick breathes. He has to press a hand against his cock, close his eyes for a second, just to process how needy and wrecked Jonny sounds. “I- Yeah. Yeah okay.”

Movements slightly frantic now, he pulls his fingers out of Jonny, starts unbuttoning his jeans. He _needs_ to get in Jonny, like, yesterday, can’t not do exactly what Jonny wants when it’s asked with that sort of voice, can’t not fuck Jonny when he needs to get off so bad it’s starting to hurt.

“Okay, okay,” he says. “I’m gonna-“

He snags the jeans and boxers under his balls, then, after a moment of consideration, pushes both down so they’re resting on the mattress instead, and knee-walks between Jonny’s legs, allowing him to line himself up. Just the touch of his own hand against his aching cock makes him hiss quietly. He’s about to run his cock between Jonny’s cheeks, just for some friction, when he halts again.

“Ah,” he says. “Condom.”

Quickly, he reaches out for the one Jonny threw on the mattress earlier, and tears it with his teeth, for lack of two good hands to use. His hands are a little frantic, and he has to concentrate on the condom and how to roll it on, because- because he hasn’t used condoms since like, 2007. The time it had taken Jason to have Patrick get tested. He figures the direction out quickly enough, though, and rolls the condom onto his dick immediately.

“There we go,” he says softly when he’s done.

The push inside is like a high. The pure bliss of the rush, wanting to push for more right away, and it’s only the fact that Patrick has to concentrate on Jonny and not slamming home too fast that keeps him from letting go completely.

But no, he’s fucking another person, beautiful, wonderful Jonny, who looks as debauched from the back, with his ass pushed up in the air inviting, rim red and spread around the tip of Patrick’s cock, as he had with his legs spread for Patrick.

Patrick pushes in slowly, controls the pace of his hips despite how bad he wants to just slam in. He spreads Jonny’s cheeks with both hands so he can watch his cock slowly sink in, groans at the picture it makes. It’s like the pressure on his cock is building, building, until there’s black spots dancing in front of his eyes and his hands are digging into Jonny’s ass so hard that, when he relaxes them, there’s white traces across Jonny’s skin.

“You look so good,” he says. “Spread around my cock like that, Jesus. You should look at yourself. You’re so-“ He bottoms out, lets out a rough gasp. “Oh god.”

“Fuck, Pat,” Jonny gets out between gritted teeth.

He reaches blindly behind himself, like he wants to feel the place where they’re joined, so Patrick leads his hand there. They both moan when Jonny runs his fingers along his spread rim, clenching down hard.

“I should see myself?” he echoes breathlessly, slowly pulling himself off Patrick’s cock, the tiniest bit, only to rock his hips back again, getting Patrick back inside to the hilt. “Can’t, sorry. If you had fucked me in the restroom yesterday I could have-” He repeats the motion, squeezing tightly for the first part and then again when Patrick is buried all the way back inside of him. “I could have seen myself in the mirror then, but not- Not what you see, eh? That’s all for you.”

Patrick can’t move an inch. He’s locked up in place, all of his muscles tense because seriously, he’s going to come if he moves. He breathes out, shudders at Jonny fucking himself on his cock – not even for real, just the slightest pull and push-back. It’s still sending electric shocks all the way through Patrick’s body, causing his thighs to shake, and Patrick grips Jonny’s hip to steady himself, fingers digging in again.

“I’m- Just give me a second,” he asks, breathing in deep before he opens his eyes again, watches the way Jonny’s naked back stretches out in front of him.

He’s pretty sure he’s come faster than Jonny every time that they’ve had sex up until now, and while he doesn’t have a lot of hope for now either, he still wants to make it worth it for Jonny. Carefully, he angles his hips back. Slides back in. His teeth are working his bottom lip hard, and his blood is singing with how good it feels, but he hasn’t come yet. Which is good.

He tries again, rocking out, back in, tries to go harder this time. He shudders. Then he reaches around Jonny’s body with his right hand to get it around Jonny’s cock, and yeah, that’s better, both because it gets Jonny to clench instinctively, and because that way he can get Jonny there faster too. He focuses on the rhythm of his hand, then, tries to get his hips to follow the same one, in and out, in and out, until he falls into it enough that he trusts himself to pick up the pace. He runs his thumb over the slit of Jonny’s cock, at the same time trying to aim for his prostate.

Jonny lets out a moan that turns into a whine when Patrick starts going harder, clenching down around Patrick’s cock, his own pulsing inside Patrick’s hand. With every thrust of Patrick’s hips, he shakes, signalling with every inch of his body that Patrick is getting him just right, so Patrick does his best not to veer off course. Patrick wants to make him gasp, does so every time his cock brushes against Jonny’s prostate, every time a twist of his wrist gets Jonny just right.

“I’ll fuck you against a mirror next time,” he promises, feverish with it. “I’ll fuck you wherever you want. You’re so good for me now, so hot. Wish I could take a picture of you like that.”

“You can,” Jonny gets out, panting heavily. “Take a picture, I mean. Just don’t put it on the internet. And- fuck.”

Patrick shakes his head like he’s in a daze.

“I won’t,” he says, keeps jerking Jonny off, marvelling over the way Jonny’s entire body quivers under each and every of Patrick’s thrusts. “God, you’re so- Fucking surreal. Taking it so good.”

He squeezes his eyes shut when a thrust of his hips drags yet another moan from Jonny’s lips. Jonny’s voice is deep and pretty fucking hot even when he talks, but hearing him like this, panting, moaning, groaning at the rhythm of Patrick’s thrusts, is rushing Patrick closer even to the edge. He feels like every thrust of his hips is propelling him closer to coming, like he’s going to hit a point of no return soon, and it takes all of the will he has, in a near super-human effort, but he forces himself to still his hips, jerkily, until he’s just kneeling between Jonny’s open legs and panting.

He barely takes a second to breath, then rocks his hips forward, less to fuck into Jonny, and more grinding his cock against where he presumes Jonny’s prostate to be, given the response he’s getting. It’s less intense for him, which is his last attempt at lasting. It’s not enough to keep him from the edge, though, can’t be when they’ve been going at this for so long, and barely half a dozen rolls of his hips later, his orgasm hits him like a brick wall, before he can do anything to stop it.

“Oh, oh god, _Jonny_ ,” he moans, fingers tightening around Jonny’s cock.

He keeps fisting it, keeps rolling his hips to get both the most out of his own orgasm and give it to Jonny, until he can’t stand it anymore and has to pull out, too sensitive. With shivering, trembling limbs, he lies down next to Jonny and tugs at his neck to get him closer, get his mouth on Jonny’s. His hand reaches blindly between their bodies to get Jonny’s cock and help him get there too, injured hand resting still against Jonny’s chest.

“Cmon baby,” he says, eyes closed, lips barely an inch from Jonny’s. He wraps a leg over Jonny’s to pull Jonny’s leg between his. “You look so good, you’re so good, got me off so hard. I don’t think I’ve come this hard in years.” He kisses Jonny again, sweet, a counterpoint to the movement of his hand. He can _feel_ how close Jonny is getting with every twist of Patrick’s wrist. “Give it up for me.”

Jonny whines, like it’s not quite enough, though, so Patrick sucks his bottom lip into his mouth and tries harder, faster. Like always, Jonny ends up surprising him anyway. He reaches behind himself, arm moving without Patrick understanding what’s happening right away until he opens his eyes to follow the twist of Jonny’s elbow and can only guess.

With Jonny rocking backwards onto his fingers and then back into Patrick’s fist, it’s over really fucking quickly after that.

Vowels spill out of Jonny’s mouth like out of a broken pitcher, not quite words, stuttering against Patrick’s body, and then he’s shooting long streaks of white between their bodies, coating Patrick’s hand, and probably the sheets and Patrick’s shirt at the same time. Patrick doesn’t care. Jonny’s beautiful, warm, and he’s there, pressed against Patrick. Patrick hasn’t felt this content in years. He smiles, leans in to kiss Jonny again, softer, sweeter than anything they’d shared before.

For once, they already are lying in bed, and Patrick is going to take the occasion for what it’s worth. He already has Jonny’s leg trapped between his, wipes his fingers on Jonny’s stomach before lacing an arm around Jonny’s waist. Patrick doesn’t want to let go just yet. With a sigh, he relaxes into the mattress.

“So, this was pretty damn great, eh?” Jonny mumbles against Patrick's skin, with a little laugh. “'m really glad you came over. Let me just-“

Pressing a kiss to Patrick's lips, he reaches down, gently taking his soft cock in hand, stripping off the condom. Patrick’s eyes blink open owlishly. He watches Jonny tie the condom quickly, tossing it into the garbage can before kissing Patrick again, smile soft and dopey.

“Taking care of me?” Patrick asks sleepily. He smiles, kissing Jonny back gratefully. “Thanks. Yeah. Very good.” He closes his eyes, feeling floaty, and sleepier than he manages most nights when he goes to bed. A soft sigh escapes his lips. “We should do that again, yeah?”

Maybe he can allow himself to fall asleep here.

It’s already too late to back out of this. Patrick is slipping, allowing himself more and more, because it’s so easy to feel invincible inside this bubble he’s built with Jonny. He wants to just let go.

“We definitely should,” Jonny agrees, reaching out to pull a blanket over the both of them. Probably because he’s still the only one naked, and Patrick’s body heat can only do so much to cover him.

Patrick doesn’t really care, just happy that Jonny seems to agree with his plans to nap. He hums, pleased. A part of his brain is attempting to remind him of all the things that need to be taken care of at Showtime, in HQ. He shushes it easily. Mob business can come later. Right now, the only people that exist are Jonny and Patrick.

Patrick has his pants and boxers around his knees, which is annoying, so he pulls both up, and then wraps an arm around Jonny’s waist again, burying his nose in his hair. It’s definitely too much affection too soon, because one-night-stands don’t cuddle this much, as far as he’s aware, but hey, Jonny’s not complaining. Patrick is happy to just be an idiot all the way through instead of backtracking at a point where it’s already too late, and Jonny’s skin is soft and he smells good.

 

~~~

 

When Patrick wakes up, it’s the middle of the afternoon. The light that’s shining through the window has taken a brighter, more sated tint, and Patrick can feel in his body that it’s been more than a couple hours since he’s gone to sleep. Everything is warm and comfortable, limbs heavy in a deep, satiated way that Patrick doesn’t get to feel often.

Jonny’s arm is draped over his middle, Jonny’s face smushed into the pillows as he sleeps on his stomach, breathing loudly. Patrick looks at him, fondness creeping through in a way that causes the corner of his mouth to twist up. He lifts his hand to gently trace lines along Jonny’s cheek, his jaw, light butterfly touches. Jonny doesn’t move, still fast asleep. It doesn’t look like Patrick had been the only one to have sleep to catch up on.

There’s an urge to kiss Jonny deep in Patrick’s gut that he pushes down, letting out a sigh. With every passing second, his brain is coming more online, making him feel off and alien inside his own skin. He’s too warm, too relaxed, too content to be here. Patrick doesn’t quite know how to process the feeling. A sense of urgency comes creeping up on him – urgency for what, he isn’t sure. He just knows that he can’t be staying inside Jonny’s space for this long, can’t relax so completely.

Patrick broke the rules the first time he let Jonny suck his dick, the second time in the club bathroom, again today, and just because there were no consequences the first two times around doesn’t mean that he can become careless. The longer he stays away from his real life, the more his absence will be noticed, and suspicions are not something that he can afford. Not when what he is doing is so dangerous.

It’s thoughts like these that mean that Patrick can’t stay. Letting himself be here, touching Jonny like he’s something that Patrick can have, it’s all a scam he’s conducting against himself. He’s living on borrowed time, until he fucks up and all the consequences he keeps trying not to think about come crashing down on him. On the both of them.

Stomach already tying into knots, Patrick sits up, disentangling himself from Jonny’s embrace, mourning the loss of contact immediately. Jonny stirs, letting out a noise that is somewhere between a groan and a whine, and frowning in his sleep as he rubs his cheek against the pillow. Then, he stills again. Patrick smiles, endeared. He runs a hand from Jonny’s shoulder blades down to the dip of his back, where the blanket has bunched up. He fiercely wishes that things were different.

“I’m gonna go,” he says into the quiet room.

Jonny makes a noise, but doesn’t otherwise move. Patrick lets his hand go further, over the blanket, brushing along the curve of Jonny’s ass, until it’s resting on the back of Jonny’s thigh.

“Jonny,” he calls softly. “I’m gonna go, okay?”

“No,” Jonny mumbles, turning his face away from Patrick so it’s completely buried against the pillow and he has got to have trouble breathing.

Patrick lets out a tiny laugh. It doesn’t look like Jonny is going to relinquish his hold on sleep willingly, here, and if Patrick weren’t feeling so awful inside, he would be enjoying this new side of Jonny thoroughly. He hopes Jonny is always this bad with wake-ups.

“ _Jonny_ ,” he insists, tapping his fingers against Jonny’s thigh. “Come on.”

“Ugh,” Jonny says feelingly, but he finally rolls over onto his back so he can squint at Patrick, legs tangled in the blanket in such a way that only one of his thighs ends up being covered by it.

It gives Patrick an eyeful of Jonny’s dick again, soft and pretty, and Patrick’s eyes linger, there and everywhere else. Now that they’re not in the middle of having sex anymore, he wants to ask about the thin, white scar that spans Jonny’s chest. He wants to tease Jonny about the way he purses his lips and makes a face like Patrick waking him up is the worst thing that happened to him all day. He wants to press kisses into Jonny’s warm skin.

“Whaddissit,” Jonny asks, but his brain must be coming online too, now, because his face morphs into something less hostile as he props himself up on his elbows.

“I’m gonna go,” Patrick repeats for the third time. “Because, you know. Work. It’s busy stuff, saving the world.”

He gives Jonny a lopsided smile, and Jonny blinks.

“Okay?” He sits up completely, taking a few seconds to gather himself. “You don’t want to finish breakfast?”

“It’s the middle of the afternoon,” Patrick points out.

“Breakfast is the most important meal of the day,” Jonny answers, like he’s reciting something that he’s used to saying a lot.

Patrick feels incredibly fond, and while that helps with the anxiety, somewhat, it also makes it all worse. It’s too close to actual feelings, and Patrick isn’t supposed to have those. Especially not when he can’t even manage to want to push said feelings down. Indulging in them is definitely not what he should be doing.

“I’ll grab the leftover cookies and eat them on my way to work,” Patrick promises. “Since it’s not like you’re gonna eat them.”

“Huh,” Jonny says, eyes dropping into Patrick’s lap. “You’ve still got come on your shirt.”

“It would appear so,” Patrick agrees loftily. He considers for a moment whether he should drive by Trump tower on his way to the Showtime offices. “Nah, I’ll just run some water over it. Come comes off easily enough.”

“Or I could lend you a shirt,” Jonny says, leaning forward to drop his chin on top of Patrick’s shoulder.

Patrick’s stomach does a small flip, because of course it does. He lets out a breath, anxiety and want mixing together indiscernibly in his chest. Gently, he places a hand on Jonny’s shoulder, not quite pushing. It’s still enough for Jonny to get the message and sit up again, disappointment flickering over his face. It’s an expression Patrick is starting to get familiar with on him by now.

“It’s fine,” Patrick says. He offers Jonny a small, grateful smile, knowing that it won’t be enough. “Thanks, yeah?

“I wouldn’t mind,” Jonny says, shrugging.

Patrick rubs his thumb against the dip between Jonny’s shoulder and his clavicle before he regretfully pulls back, breaking contact. Then, rolling his shoulders to get all remaining sleepiness out of his limbs, he gets up. He still has to yawn once he’s standing.

“I know, but it’s fine,” he says. “Thanks for, uhm-“ He clears his throat, feeling himself flush, “today. It was really good.”

He’s embarrassed to be embarrassed, and even more embarrassed that he’s letting it show. Jonny is making him weak and easy to read. It’s stupid. He feels stupid. It’s like he’s a fumbling virgin thanking Jonny for letting him fuck him in the ass because that still feels like it came out of a wet dream. Jonny has no business impacting him like that, much less making him want to be vulnerable. Patrick shouldn’t want to be vulnerable. The little part of him that wants to bare itself to Jonny is just plain delirious.

“Yeah,” Jonny says, leaning back with his arms propped up behind him, shameless about his nudity. He smiles, too, clearly pleased by Patrick’s stuttering. “You can come by again any time.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter warnings:**  
>  \- Just sex, really, and some first time experiences. Some internalised-ish stuff and clichees that get dealt with.
> 
> This was the last chapter of the porn trilogy, we're going to get back to actual story-telling soon, I promise.


	6. Chapter 6

****As soon as he gets home from work, Patrick googles Jonny. It’s about time that he did, because the last thing Patrick needs is to be letting his defences down in front of someone that could be any sort of threat to the organisation. Someone who could be tricking Patrick back when Patrick thought that he was the one making up lies and feeling so damn smart about it.

The thing is, he’s not an important enough member of the mob to be a direct target for any rivalling gangs, but he knows only too well that sometimes, infiltration starts from the bottom. He wouldn’t get targeted because eliminating him would be meaningful in any way. It’s all about information. And Jason has made sure that Patrick understood just exactly what sort of risk he could expose them to if the information he shares with Patrick – not just because of his job but because of their relationship – got into the wrong hands.

At the end of the day, Jonny could be some sort of mole, whether intentionally or not. He seems charming, sweet, naïve even – and unbelievably hot – and it’s partly _because_ he’s so perfect that Patrick knows that he needs to be suspicious. Anyone who did extensive background checks into him could stumble onto his past relationship with Ty and decide that hiring a cute gay boy would be the best way to work themselves past Patrick’s resistances.

Even Patrick stumbling into him by accident again at the bar he’d gone to with his work buddies could be interpreted as some scheme instead of incredible chance. Of course, it’s not really _lucky_ chance, because everything about this deal with Jonny is a danger to Patrick’s relationship with Jason, and thus Patrick himself, but he’s just going to run with the theory that anyone who would try to recruit someone into seducing him wouldn’t be aware of his relationship with his boss. It’s one of his and Jason’s most locked-down secrets, by virtue of endangering them both, and no other living soul suspects anything about it, to Patrick’s knowledge.

Still, Patrick only has limited resources available to him in terms of doing background checks on someone from his personal laptop. He can’t let the mob know that he’s looking into Jonny at all, which means that he’s going to have to resort to classic internet-stalking and whatever he can find on the dark web, sitting in bed at Trump tower with a half-finished beer bottle next to him. It makes him wish that he had personal contacts in the police that he could ask to check if they had an informant called Jonathan Toews. Knowing Jonny since college means that Patrick is pretty sure that it’s his real name, at least.

Maybe Jonny could have been recruited after making that first contact with Patrick at the hospital. It seems unlikely, because someone would have had to be watching their exchange and thought that Jonny would be a good candidate for such an operation, but Patrick prefers being safe than sorry.

Of course, the safest would be to cut ties regardless, but Patrick prefers to obsess over Jonny’s social medias instead of sleeping rather than consider that another time.

A quick scan through the dark web gets him no results on Jonny other than information on his medical occupation at the University hospital, as a sort of staff member, which Patrick already knew. Patrick doesn’t have access to any medical records or criminal records because unfortunately, he’s not a hacker and he has no idea how to do that shit. No version of Jonny’s name producing any results in the online illegal services industry means that he’s really going to have to restrain himself to Jonny’s public social media.

Patrick is doing this for actual, legitimate reasons – professional ones. So when he googles _Jonathan Toews_ , and then _Jonny Toews_ , and actually does find a Twitter handle, _@jonnytoews_ , the very unprofessional delight he feels is uncalled for, but. But he’s curious.

Jonny’s profile picture is a miniaturised version of him sitting in some guy’s miniaturised lap, which first has Patrick raise a surprised eyebrow, vaguely irritated by the implications that this could have. Clicking on the small picture, though, shows that the guy in question is, in fact, TJ, from back when he still had that horrible bleached hair. It actually helps Patrick recognise him, because this is how he remembers him, from back in college. That image is actually a lot clearer than the few glimpses Patrick got of TJ when he first got coffee with Jonny and last night.

Jonny and TJ both look young and dumb in the picture, even if Patrick only manages to zoom in so much on it. And Patrick knew that Jonny had had a crush on TJ in the past, but this shit looks a little too homoerotic to be completely innocent, in Patrick’s opinion. TJ’s hand is on Jonny’s hip, holding him in place. They might even be drunk. Which is a little bit hilarious. It’s definitely not the picture perfect boy impression that Patrick would have expected out of Jonny’s Twitter.

With a grin, he reaches for his phone.

_[To: Josh]_

_B honest withme_

_Did u fuck TJ Oshie_

He saved Jonny into his phone as Josh, earlier, once he had effectively deleted their text conversation and the not-quite-dick-pic that Jonny had sent him this morning, because while he can’t afford to have _that_ stuff on it, he still wanted to be able to text Jonny. Right now, it seems like the perfect excuse to bother Jonny and maybe try to be friends with him again, on top of having fucked him (which Patrick is far from over). If Jonny is a mole, it will alert him to Patrick looking into him, and maybe he will drop the act. Otherwise, it’s just a bit of fun.

It barely takes half a minute for Jonny to answer his message, anyway.

_[From: Josh]_

_I'm always honest with you._

_Also, yes, we fucked once. Why?_

The confirmation actually takes Patrick by surprise, because while he knows that Jonny used to crush on him, they also live together, and they’re still pretty damn comfortable with each other, it would seem. Patrick knows that sex doesn’t necessarily have to mean anything, but given the presence of an actual girlfriend in TJ’s life, he had thought that TJ was just one of those straight guys who thought playing gay is fun. That Jonny and him are still friends after that sort of history sounds…interesting.

_[To: Josh]_

_ur face_

Patrick snickers, scrolling through Jonny’s Twitter again, as he takes a swig from his beer. He isn’t particularly inclined to give Jonny any more of a reaction. It’s not like he cares who Jonny fucked. Not even if the guy in question is still Jonny's best friend and lives with him. That would be overstepping more boundaries than Patrick can afford to.

Most of the posts at the top of Jonny’s Twitter are political stuff, reminders from Jonny to “save the bees” or “let women dispose of their own bodies”, links to petitions about stopping nuclear energy and human trafficking. Patrick scrolls over that last one a little quicker than the others.

While the mob dropped most of their activity in the prostitution department, Patrick distinctly remembers the few times he helped escort girls that were definitely not there of their own free will. Sharpy is in charge of everything money laundering in the mob, which means that he also manages their single prostitution rink, one of the evils of working in the mob that Patrick has long come to terms with. He gets a feeling that spending a little too much time with his nose in Jonny’s activism might reawaken qualms that he once had in that department.

Thankfully his phone buzzes again, with a confused, _What's that supposed to mean?_ from Jonny that has Patrick roll his eyes.

_[To: Josh]_

_Ur face is so beautiful bby_

_How could he ever resist u?_

He pauses for a split second, leer spreading on his face.

_WAIT_

_bootiful_

_:)))))_

_Ur so bootiful Jonny_

There’s a disappointing lack of booty in Jonny’s Twitter, really. No pictures of him at all other than the gay-ass profile picture, and the pictures TJ tags him in, because he apparently enjoys paparazziing Jonny when he isn’t looking and putting the results up online. Patrick sees the occasional protest from Jonny in the replies, but he’s pretty sure that Jonny doesn’t mind. There’s also pictures of Jonny’s food that look like Jonny put way too much effort into the arrangement of dish and cutlery. It’s hilarious.

Jonny doesn’t have a profile description, because he’s boring, but he does have a YouTube channel linked. Comforted in his assumption that Jonny might not be some sort of scheme constructed to get information on Jason out of Patrick after all, Patrick clicks on it, expecting some Indie song that’s the hymn to Jonny’s soul, or something similar - Jonny’s favourite song, like back when Myspace used to be a thing.

It’s better than that. So, so much better than that.

Patrick’s phone buzzes with an answer, but Patrick is too busy taking in the beauty that is the screen in front of him to react right away, this time. _JonnyBT_ the channel title reads, under a picture of Jonny plucking a guitar that spans the upper half of the screen. Jonny looks concentrated on it, gaze directed away from the camera, bare feet folded in front of him on the grass. It’s kind of hot, in a hippie sort of way.

Patrick is grinning uncontrollably at his screen. Jonny has a _YouTube channel_.

“Best day ever,” he says into the empty room, running his cursor over the videos.

The thumbnails all show Jonny sitting on some sort of surface – his bed or his couch, mostly, but when Patrick clicks on _All videos_ , there are a couple that seem to have been filmed outside, with his guitar in hand. Sometimes he’s smiling, sometimes looking down at his guitar in concentration, and every time, Patrick can’t believe his eyes.

He hadn’t even known that Jonny could play the guitar, much less sing. Because he has to, Patrick thinks. The titles of the videos are all song titles with {COVER BY JONNYBT} at the end, no mention of it being just a guitar cover. He even spots one that says {ORIGINAL SONG}. A laugh escapes his lips, delighted.

Quickly, he picks up his phone again to open Jonny’s answer.

_[From: Josh]_

_He slept with me because he was drunk and he and Lauren had just broken up._

_Oh my god_

_Thanks though :)_

Patrick blinks for a second, reading Jonny’s explanation. He supposed that it justifies how both TJ and Jonny managed to stay clean of any tangled-up feelings – it had been clear at the time of them sleeping together that it had only been a rebound on TJ’s part. Given that he’s back with Lauren now, it must have been clear for Jonny too that there was no future for anything more than the sex between them.

Quickly, though, Patrick discards the thought. He has more important things to focus on on the screen right in front of.

_[To: Josh]_

_I FOUND YOUR YOUTUBE CHANNEL!!!!!_

_:D :D :D :D_

Then he throws the phone down and clicks play on the first video.

 _The Innocence Mission - Lakes of Canada {COVER BY JONNYBT}_ the title of the video reads, because of course Jonny covered a Canadian-ass song. Patrick chugs the rest of his beer so he can put it aside, moving his laptop down the bed and lying down on his stomach in front of it, chin supported by his hands. The video starts with an empty couch, some background rustling, and then there’s Jonny sitting down in front of the camera, starting to pluck at his guitar with sure, deft fingers.

It’s not quite a happy song, toning down on Patrick’s excitement, but it doesn’t do anything to qualm his fascination. Jonny looks concentrated as he plays, beautiful despite the grainy quality of the video. Patrick doesn’t know how to play any instruments, so, in his very uninstructed opinion, he thinks that even the guitar introduction sounds great.

Then he starts singing, and Patrick forgets to grin, too busy staring at the screen.

He’s pretty sure that boys with guitars who sing by camp fires are some sort of fuckboy trope, something that always gets the girls, and damn if it’s not doing it for Patrick too. Jonny’s voice is low, slightly husky, comfortable in the way he carries the melody. It’s melancholy for sure, and combined with the dim lighting of Jonny’s living room – he must have filmed this in the late afternoon – there’s an atmosphere to it that that has him unable to look away. God, he can’t even make fun of this, it’s _good_.

 _Oh. Well, I hope you like it_ , Jonny has written him, and Patrick shakes his head at his phone a little, having trouble believing how much of a ridiculous human being Jonny is, and how the hell Patrick managed to land someone like him _without_ him being an undercover agent.

Jonny wants to become a baby doctor, passed his exams brilliantly, has too many food allergies, does yoga, goes to protests, and he has a goddamn YouTube channel where he posts melancholic country covers. Nothing about him is like anyone else that Patrick knows. Even if Patrick tried to compare him to Ty, someone who at least doesn’t belong to the mafia, there aren’t that many elements in common. They’re both students, they’re both messy. Patrick is pretty sure that’s where the similarities stop – thankfully for Patrick’s sanity.

It’s probably an issue that Patrick already likes Jonny so much better than anyone else, without even knowing him for that long.

He clicks on the next video, smile finding its way back onto his face at the sight of an _Imagine_ cover. He remembers it being Jessie’s favourite song, six years ago. It’s less of a Canadian stereotype this time, and closer to the image of a classic guitar-wielding fuckboy.

Except that Patrick doesn’t think that that’s Jonny’s motivation here. Sure, Jonny has slept around a lot, but the guitar and singing can’t have been things he’d started just to get innocent boys like Patrick to moon over him. Not that Patrick _isn’t_ mooning over him. Jonny just looks like the kind of guy who is too earnest to resort to tricks like that and plays the guitar because he _likes_ it.

Patrick clicks on the next video. _Patty Griffin - Mary_. Then _John Legend - All of me_. Then _Kyla la Grange - Vampire Smile_. Then _The Rolling Stones - Ruby Tuesday_. It’s not even the kind of music Patrick usually listens to, but he can’t look away. Jonny is so fucking hot, Jesus. Patrick will never be over it.

Finally, he grabs his phone again, not wanting to torture Jonny with his silence, and looks at his text messages, for a second, clicking his tongue in search for words. He sort of wants to tease Jonny, still, but at the same time, he’s genuinely impressed, and Jonny probably deserves to know that. Patrick has to roll his eyes at himself. Genuine feelings, ugh.

_[To: Josh]_

_U don’t suck I guess_

_:P_

It doesn’t take long for Jonny to answer. Which is adorable, because it really does mean that Jonny was waiting on his verdict, and Patrick just spent half an hour watching his videos without replying to him. Patrick imagines Jonny being nervous, maybe checking his phone every couple of minutes to see whether he has an answer already. It makes him press a grin against the back of his hand.

_[From: Josh]_

_Yeah?_

_I'm glad you like it._

Jonny is adorable.

_[To: Josh]_

_I do_

_Despite ur clear horrible taste in music_

_[From: Josh]_

_Excuse me??_

Patrick laughs into the dark room around him, fingers finding their way into spelling out for Jonny exactly how boring country music is.

They spend the next half an hour texting back and forth, Patrick mocking Jonny about how Canadian his channel is, and then making up answers for Jonny’s question about how his job went today. He informs Jonny that he fought off an evil monster down by the Lake, so that the monster wouldn’t kidnap all of Chicago’s children, which Jonny for some reason does not actually believe him, despite Patrick’s assurances that his team of sporty children from Showtime helped him defeat the monster through the power of friendship. It’s classic superhero stuff.

Eventually, though, he ends up wondering why the hell Jonny is still answering him when it’s clearly the middle of the night. Jonny just shoots back that he isn’t the one with a daytime job, which is fair, because Jonny’s exams are done, and Patrick is clearly the one with more work tomorrow.

As soon as he has wished Jonny a good night, Patrick sticks his hand down his underwear and jerks off thinking of Jonny’s smile and the way his ass had felt around his dick this morning. He’s vaguely aware of the cameras, at the edge of his mind, but he doesn’t think Jason checks those all that much anymore, and it’s not like he will know who it is that Patrick is thinking about. When Patrick comes into his fist, panting, he doesn’t feel any guilt towards Jason. He’s riding a high, with Jonny, and he’s riding it hard.

 

~~~

 

The next time Patrick fucks Jonny – because of course there’s a next time – Patrick runs into TJ on his way to the kitchen, where a fucked-out Jonny had informed him Patrick would find snacks. It’s late at night, meaning that Patrick should probably be heading back to Trump tower to sleep, but also meaning that unless there’s an emergency, Patrick doesn’t have any work to go back to until tomorrow.

Given that the weapons for the Rosati order has been shipped from Ireland over to Freedom land, and that charity emergencies aren’t a thing, Patrick thinks he’s fairly safe in that regard. Jason is always a wild card, because he likes to just walk into Patrick’s space unannounced sometimes, but it’s not like Patrick can’t just drive home if he’s told to and make up an excuse. Up until now, Jason has bought all of the stories Patrick has given him concerning Jonny. Something about visiting one of his schools for Showtime, the first time around, and then about going out with Temi, who he knew was out with Amelie and wouldn’t be home to deny Patrick’s claim.

Still, Patrick should leave, if anything because staying the night implies things that Patrick can’t allow, and he hopes that getting snacks will keep him away from Jonny long enough for his mind to clear of the haze Jonny always seems to put him under. The longer he stays, the harder the crash is likely to be when he leaves. Jonny truly has his number, in more ways than one.

There’s the sound of keys turning in the lock as Patrick walks around the kitchen counter, followed by a door being opened. It’s not hard to guess that TJ is coming home, Jonny having mentioned something about TJ being out for the evening only, but all of Patrick’s senses still immediately snap to attention, wary of the intrusion. He finishes making his way towards the fridge, fully aware that he won’t be able to avoid TJ by turning back, and bracing for the meeting instead.

It’s a surprise, really, that it even took that long for Patrick to properly run into TJ. He has seen him a couple of times, usually from afar, because Jonny hangs out with TJ a lot outside of their apartment. When Patrick is here, though, TJ has always happened to be “busy”.

Patrick just regrets that it has to happen while he’s barefoot and naked from the waist up. Sure, he let Jonny see him like that, but that doesn’t mean that Patrick enjoys it in this context. Patrick is a fan of clothes, in general. Especially when he’s meeting people for the first time. He taps his fingers against his thigh in a nervous tick, the other opening the fridge for inspection.

“Oh,” a voice from behind him says. “What are _you_ doing here?”

The light gets flicked on, so Patrick closes the fridge door again, turning to face TJ instead, body relaxing into an open stance despite his general discomfort. He smiles easily, ignoring the way TJ’s arms are crossed in front of his body, emanating distrust.

TJ probably thinks that Patrick isn’t good for Jonny. Patrick guesses that that makes two of them.

“Just looking for snacks,” he says, gesturing back towards the fridge.

TJ raises an eyebrow that clearly communicates his scepticism. Patrick can’t blame him for it – it’s the middle of the night, and Patrick looking through TJ and Jonny’s pantry shirtless does tick off a lot of stranger danger boxes. It’s a good thing that TJ at least knows who he is. Patrick would prefer to avoid getting the cops called on him.

“Where’s Jonny?” TJ asks bluntly.

Patrick’s smile doesn’t falter. “In bed.”

“Hm,” TJ grunts, looking Patrick up and down, lingering on Patrick’s tattoo sleeve for a second. It makes Patrick skin itch. “Well I can guess what you’ve been up to.”

Patrick just shrugs. He can’t hide that he just had sex with Jonny in his situation, so he might as well own up to it, as unpleasant as this conversation is looking to be. He smiles at TJ angelically.

“I’m sorry, am I intruding? Because I can leave if you want me to. I was just going to-”

“Jonny’s a good guy,” TJ interrupts him. Patrick sighs internally. He’d hoped for an excuse to leave, but this looks like he’s about to get a shovel talk instead. Jesus. He steels himself, smiling politely. “I don’t care if you’re going to cheat on your girlfriend with him, but that’s your problem, not his. So you better not get him in trouble with her just because you wanna bang him.”

Patrick lets his smile drop, because he doesn’t want TJ to think Patrick is making fun of him or that he isn’t taking him seriously. He shoves his hands inside his pockets, letting some awkwardness seep through. It makes his injured wrist twinge, but he ignores it. He needs to play his cards well, because at the end of the day, he’s better off with TJ liking him.

The thing is, though, TJ’s warning is closer to the truth of what’s likely to happen than he probably realises. The relationship that Patrick is in really could pose real trouble for Jonny. Something that would have nothing to do with heartbreak. Not that Patrick plans on breaking Jonny’s heart either. It’s not something that will happen, because Jonny isn’t going to fall in love with Patrick. They’re just going to keep fucking until Patrick manages to get his head out of his ass and do the right thing by cutting off contact with Jonny again. Hopefully before the trouble TJ is talking about catches up with them.

Patrick keeps his voice soft when he says, “I think that’s up to him to decide, right?” TJ’s face is stormy. Patrick straightens his shoulders enough that he’ll appear sure of himself, without in any way threatening or challenging TJ. “He _could_ just say no. Like. I told him to say no.” He shrugs. “I don’t know what to tell you, man.”

TJ gives him a measuring look, eyes brushing over Patrick’s arm. “I’m just saying, if this blows up, you better deal with her yourself.”

“That’s fair,” Patrick says. “I mean, the goal is obviously that she won’t find out, but if she ever does,” never ever ever if Patrick can help it, “I’ll make sure she leaves Jonny alone.”

Patrick knows how to manipulate Jason after all. If it ever comes to it, he might be able to redirect most of Jason’s anger onto himself, convince him that there is no need to look into who exactly it is Patrick has been sleeping with. Patrick can take a few hits. It’s a faint hope, but Patrick trusts his own ability to spin a story even in the heat of the moment. He lifts one eyebrow, tilting his head ever-so-slightly.

“Why, you got any experiences with girlfriends coming after Jonny?” he asks TJ. “Or did _you_ hook up with someone who was already in a relationship? And it ended badly?”

TJ snorts. “No man, I’m taken as hell. Jonny’s the one who sleeps with straight guys.”

Patrick isn’t surprised, after what Jonny told him about the straight guys that always “come back for more” with him. Patrick doesn’t know of any crazy girlfriends, but he can imagine it. As much as Jonny appears like a goody-two-shoes, he sure doesn’t have any qualms about being the reason for a relationship to break up. He seems perfectly content with leaving that choice up to the guys he sleeps with. Patrick shrugs, giving TJ a grin.

“Who knows, maybe Lauren had a crazy girlfriend when you met her.”

This time, TJ actually laughs. Just the mention of his girlfriend’s name seems to incrementally relax his stance. Patrick’s grin widens, knowing that he’s at least succeeded at defusing the tension. Knowing Lauren’s name is something that creates a sense of familiarity, and Patrick knows how to score points like that. Hopefully, TJ won’t explicitly consider him a threat anymore, whether he approves or not.

“No?” he continues on teasingly. “Jonny told me you invite him to have threesomes with you and her sometimes. There’s gotta be some sort of same-sex agreement at least.”

“Jonny shouldn’t blab around like this,” TJ says, rolling his eyes. He glances to the wall, where countless of photographs of him, Lauren, and Jonny over the years are hung up on a pin board. It’s sweet. It also looks like three people live here, instead of two. “And the arrangement isn’t gender based, it’s if _we_ like someone and they like us, _we_ might have sex with them.” He shrugs. “I’m assuming _you_ don’t have a same sex arrangement with your girlfriend, or you wouldn’t have told Jonny it’d be bad if she found out.”

“Not really, no,” Patrick says breezily. “I mean, if she wants to sleep around too, she can be my guest.”

In fact, “she” is married and probably has sex with her wife. Patrick isn’t sure. Jason’s marriage does seem pretty dead at times. It might have something to do with the fact that Jason likes to fuck boys less than half his age.

“Although I thought you wanted my relationship status to be my own problem. I’m sure my reasons don’t matter to you.”

“As long as it stays your problem,” TJ says, shrugging.

“Obviously.”

Patrick lifts a hand to brush his hair back from where a curl had been tickling his temple, and TJ’s eyes jump down to his arm, lingering on the tattoo sleeve again. It reminds Patrick of Jonny saying TJ wanted to get Lauren’s name tattooed on his chest.

Patrick smiles. “The tattoos?”

TJ looks like he’s battling with himself for a second, before he gives in and steps closer to look at Patrick’s arm. “I mean, you’ve got some wicked ones,” he admits, adding, like he can’t help himself, “I’m thinking of getting one myself.”

Patrick grins. “A tattoo, really? What are you thinking about?”

“Her name. Over my heart,” TJ says proudly, gesturing to his chest. “Or maybe her face? On my arm. But Jonny gave a hard no for that and only a soft one for the name, so.” He grins a little. “I want to surprise her with it, when I go see her this summer.”

Patrick suppresses the urge to laugh. He’s not going to ruin his own work by mocking TJ now that he’s just starting to warm up to Patrick. He is going to get TJ to like him by the end of this conversation, full stop. It’s how Patrick rolls, he always gets people to like him. It’s just easier to deal with people that way, and part of the reason why he’s so good at his job.

“You know this is a bad idea, right?” he says seriously. “People break up.” He shrugs. “But if you gotta get a person tattoo, well. Be sure about it, obviously. Also, maybe don't get anything as literal as a name or face, cause honestly, that's just bad taste dude. Do you have some sort of symbol that'd be more discreet but she'd recognise?”

TJ looks thoughtful, like he’s actually considering Patrick’s ideas. It’s somewhat worrying, because that means that TJ is serious about the tattoo thing, but, well. Patrick can try and nudge him in a safer direction. He’s doing a public service if he manages to talk TJ out of getting a name or face tattooed after all. Patrick bets Jonny would be eternally grateful to him.

“Like, for example, I have a person tattoo too,” he continues lightly, reaching up with his injured hand to point at the sun on his clavicle, casually covering up the gun shot scar that frays out the end of it at the same time. “The sun there? It’s a symbol for my mom.”

After all, the Pat who fucks Jonny and has a girlfriend still has a good relationship with his mom. Not a healthy one, because he’s putting the blame of pretending to act straight on his parents, but it makes sense inside the lie. Which is all well and good, because Patrick’s actual people tattoos, the flowers, are information that will never leave his lips, not to anyone. Not even to someone who is so far away from Patrick’s sphere of influence as TJ.

It’s unfortunate that the first lie his mind jumped to was focussed on the sun, because of the scar, but it is what it is, and the kitchen light is bad enough that maybe TJ won’t pay attention to it. Maybe TJ doesn’t even know what a gunshot wound looks like. Patrick isn’t too sure about whether civilians know how to recognise that sort of thing.

“Honestly dude, that’s pretty cool,” TJ says, visibly surprised. “I bet your mom loved that.”

“Loved what?” comes Jonny’s voice suddenly from the kitchen entrance.

Patrick looks up. There Jonny is, wearing only boxer briefs, neck littered with hickeys. He’s gorgeous, causing the corner of Patrick’s mouth to crook up instinctively. It’s hard not to be proud when Jonny looks so clearly fucked out and marked up. Patrick did that. And then there’s the fondness too, Patrick’s chest filling with how soft and sleepy Jonny looks, clearly having followed the sound of voices.

“Jesus, Toews, put some clothes on, would you,” TJ says, rolling his eyes.

Jonny flips him off, instead walking around him to wrap an arm around Patrick. And with TJ in the room, with no sexual context whatsoever, Patrick can’t help but tense when Jonny presses a kiss to his lips.

It’s too easy, too domestic. And yet, it makes Patrick melt against Jonny, just a little, when Jonny keeps his arm around Patrick’s waist. The butterflies in his chest still haven’t stopped fluttering whenever Jonny touches him, despite Patrick’s best attempts, foolish as he is. Jonny’s skin is warm and soft. Patrick reaches out to thumb at his hip, just a little.

“No but seriously,” TJ adds after a moment. He seems wryly amused, like he’s used to teasing Jonny about things like this. “Don’t hang out naked in my apartment, you filthy animals.”

Patrick doesn’t point out that he’s not exactly hanging out shirtless with TJ by choice. He guesses that he should have put something on before wandering into the kitchen and been smarter about this.

“You’re just jealous because your person to be filthy with is 800 miles away,” Jonny points out with a grin.

“At least she isn’t taken, by someone other than me,” TJ shoots back, causing Jonny to be the one to roll his eyes.

The level of comfort between the two of them sort of makes Patrick want to escape. It puts the spotlight on his sex life in a way he doesn’t know how to deal with. Between being called Jonny’s person and TJ reminding them that Patrick is taken, this entire conversation is steering towards implications that Patrick was not prepared for, and is clearly letting happen just by virtue of allowing Jonny’s arm around him.

He’s only here because he had wanted to get laid. Sure, he’s indulging the crush on Jonny he still refuses to acknowledge, but now he’s getting the shovel talk from Jonny’s best friend, and they’re hanging out in Jonny’s apartment post-hookup like that’s the normal state of things, and it’s just- It’s a lot.

It’s like TJ is saying, he’s standing out like a sore thumb, here, with his supposed girlfriend and the life he’s had to construct himself just in case something goes off script and he has to talk about himself. Because his actual life isn’t for people like TJ and Jonny, and their lives aren’t something Patrick should be allowed into. His fingers are tight again Jonny’s hip, and he has to pull himself together so he can smile at them, easy, like he doesn’t feel like a complete intruder on the inside.

“I’m my own person, I don’t belong to anyone, thank you very much,” he lies, voice light. Then, like always when he’s uncomfortable, he changes the subject. “Anyway, I was looking for snacks, but I think I spotted some carrots in the fridge, so- Carrot sticks, anyone?”

Gently, he untangles himself from Jonny so he can step towards the fridge. Given that Patrick tries to have a healthy diet, carrot sticks actually do sound more like the sort of snack he’d have in his own fridge. Patri doesn’t need the cravings that can come with sugary foods, and his sense of taste is fucked up most times anyway. The cookies from the other day have to be the only sweet thing he’s eaten in weeks.

“No one belongs to anyone,” Jonny agrees. “We just keep each other company, eh? And yes please”

He follows Patrick to the fridge and shoulders past him so he can reach into the fridge himself to pull out the bag of carrots, which he hands Patrick before getting a cutting board and a knife from the drawers.

“Nope, thanks,” TJ answers. “I’m not a rabbit, and Imma do laundry now. You are almost out of socks.”

“Me?” Jonny glances back towards TJ, raising his eyebrows. “Have you been wearing my socks again?”

TJ shrugs, already walking out. “I ran out.”

Patrick snorts, looking down at the bag of carrots in his hands. TJ and Jonny are ridiculous.

“Who does laundry at this time of the day?” he mumbles.

Sometimes he folds laundry late at night, because it’s boring, and that has something soothing to it, but starting up a load of laundry actually just means that he won’t be able to go to bed if he does end up feeling sleepy. Although as far as he knows, people with normal sleeping patterns don’t put that much thought into how to manage to fall asleep.

“TJ,” Jonny says promptly, already starting to halve carrots.

Patrick shakes his head lightly. They probably can’t talk. Eating vegetables in the middle of the night isn’t the most common thing to do either. He reaches over Jonny’s shoulder to grab one of the cut-up carrots.

“TJ tried to give me the shovel talk,” he tells Jonny, before biting off the head of the carrot stick. He chews on it, swallows. “You’ve got good friends, Jonny. You should probably listen to them.”

Jonny lets out a groan, shooting a glare in the direction of TJ’s room.

“I'm sorry,” he tells Patrick, giving him an apologetic smile. “He's a meddler. And I _am_ listening. I just disagree with him. That's all. I mean, you've been upfront about your girlfriend and stuff. So it's not like I don't know what I'm getting into.”

Patrick hums non-commitally, nibbling on the rest of his carrot. It might sound to Jonny like Patrick has been upfront, but he doesn’t even know what pretend-Patrick’s situation is, much less the truth. And the truth, of course, is that Jonny doesn’t know anything. Not who Patrick is, not what he does, not why standing here in Jonny’s kitchen at 11 pm only means trouble.

It makes the feeling of guilt that is always festering in Patrick’s gut spike up. It makes him want to bury his face against the curve of Jonny’s neck so Jonny can work his magic and make him stop thinking about the bad things again.

“It’s okay,” Patrick says. “It’s a little funny. And I’ll charm him into loving me, just you see.” He grins at Jonny, walking up to him so he can press himself along Jonny’s back and hook his chin over Jonny’s shoulder. “I gave him tattoo advice and everything.”

“I'm sure you will,” Jonny says, humming contently. “TJ is a teddy bear, he's harmless." Leaning back against Patrick’s chest, he adds: "You better told him no to get her face tattooed. I mean she's pretty and all but that's just no.”

Jonny nods to the pin board, where about a dozen Laurens look back at them. She _is_ pretty, Patrick agrees, but Jonny still wins out against her or TJ, in his opinion. He runs his nose behind Jonny’s ear, as Jonny puts down his knife to pick up a carrot stick. The smell and feel of Jonny’s naked skin really is like a drug, with how easily it allows the knots in Patrick’s stomach to loosen. It’s intoxicating.

“I told him to get her entire body,” Patrick tells Jonny lightly. “If he's gonna get a tattoo of her, he should get it right, you know? And he loves all of her, so.”

Jonny lets out a bark of laughter, head leaning back against Patrick. Patrick grins, nipping at the soft skin behind Jonny’s ear. Patrick can see the skin colouring a little under his lips, like even that little bit of teasing is already affecting Jonny.

“You better not have,” he warns, reaching back to give Patrick’s hip a nudge. “I can't have him consider that on top of everything else.”

“Why not?” Patrick asks, grinning. “I think it's a great idea.” He reaches out to run his fingers down the naked skin of Jonny's shoulder, watches how it makes the hairs on Jonny’s arm stand up. “A full-body tattoo would make for an entire sleeve, too.” His grin widens. “And it might be a few hundred bucks more, so hey, maybe he won't be able to afford it.” He pauses. “ _Or_ it'll make for the funniest way someone has ruined themselves ever.”

“He’s my best friend, I don’t want him to ruin his life,” Jonny points out sternly.

Patrick shrugs. “People’s lives are ruined every day, might as well be funny.” He grins, tilts his head sideways to kiss the line of Jonny’s jaw. “And I just meant his finances, not his life. He’d be fine.”

TJ looks like the sort of guy that would be fine. One crazy tattoo spending that empties his bank account? Not something that will impact him in the long-term. Not as a student who can afford to live in a cosy place like this one and looks well-fed, with all the opportunities in the world still open before him. TJ could just ask for help from friends, and if he breaks up with Lauren and needs the tattoo removed, he’ll just ask for a second loan. Patrick isn’t too worried for him.

“That’s cold,” Jonny says, nibbling at a carrot stick. Patrick reaches around him to get a second one for himself. “But yeah, he’d be fine. TJ’s parents have money. They own this place. That’s why I pay so little rent and TJ not at all. It’s pretty generous of them, I’ve got enough debt with my student loans.”

“Oh, I’m ice cold,” Patrick confirms, grinning easily. “But it’s nice that you don’t have to pay as much rent, I guess.”

Of fucking course TJ’s parents are rich. Patrick gets the feeling that that’s the case for most people who study for a long time. It’s just too hard to finance student loans, accommodation, and everything else at the same time while you try to study. Sure, some of them might finance part of it, but everything? There’s no way that anyone lasts five years in university without at least some outside help. Even without all the business with the drugs that fucked Patrick up in _his_ attempt.

“Anyway,” he continues, rolling his eyes playfully, as he snaps the carrot in two with his teeth, “I didn’t actually tell him to get a full-body Lauren tattoo. I told him that he should try for something less in your face than her name or face. A symbol or something.”

Jonny gives him a surprised look over his shoulder, mixed together with admiration. “That’s actually a good idea. I’ll see if I can steer him in that direction.”

“I have great ideas,” Patrick agrees.

Jonny laughs, finally turning around to face Patrick. He leans back against the counter, a bitten-off carrot stick still in hand, and Patrick just has to kiss the grin off his mouth. Jonny is too close not to, too open and beautiful, with his crooked smile and taunting, naked spans of skin. It doesn’t stop Jonny from grinning. Instead, Jonny kisses him back, smiling into the kiss, until Patrick leans back again. Jonny looks happy. Patrick is grinning back as dopily. It’s awful.

Jonny runs his fingers up and down Patrick’s right arm, along the flowers and waves that connect them to the lion’s mane, up to the lion itself. It makes Patrick shiver from the sensation.

“Would _you_ ever get a full body tattoo of your girlfriend?” Jonny asks, teasing, like he thinks he’s being smart by asking.

Patrick represses a grimace at the thought of a tattoo of Jason on his body. _Any_ tattoo to do with Jason. Jesus, Jason already owns enough of Patrick’s life without needing to be permanently inked into Patrick’s skin. Patrick seriously hopes that no one ever gives that idea to him, because it’s the sort of brand of ownership that Jason would probably get off on. It would something really tasteless too, like a tramp stamp. Patrick shakes his head, covering up the unease with a mocking smile.

“I wouldn’t know what to get a tattoo of,” Jonny continues obliviously. “I thought about it when I was sixteen and a guy from my class got one who I thought was cool, but I don’t know. I don’t think it’s really my thing. Why did you get yours?”

“My tattoos are all very deep and thought through,” Patrick says, dead-pan. Then he grins. “Like my super cool lion that I also got when I was 16 because I thought lions were cool. Lots of thought went into that one. Went to get it with my then-girlfriend.” It’s funny, really, that Patrick is judging TJ for his tattoo idea so hard when two of his own were done with an ex. The whole difference is in what the tattoos represent. The lion isn’t Abigail, and the sun certainly isn’t Ty. “The total looks cool, though. Your loss if you don’t like them.”

“Mh, it is a cool lion,” Jonny says, tracing the lines of the mane, fingers brushing up, until they’re resting against Patrick’s clavicle. Patrick shivers from the touch, and he closes his eyes, because Jonny’s fingers have stilled over the scar, and he knows what question is going to come next. “I’ve been meaning to ask-” Jonny looks at Patrick. “This scar here, it looks like it’s from a gunshot. Did that- did that happen on your security job or?”

Patrick reaches up to cover Jonny’s hand over his clavicle, noting the genuine curiosity in Jonny’s eyes. He’d gotten shot during an intimidation gig for Jason, routine. Some shop owner who hadn’t paid for protection for the past months. Patrick had gone with Oliver, one of his associates, expecting nothing more serious than a good cop bad cop conversation. The mobster version of that.

The shop owner had been waiting for them, though, and he had started shooting the second they’d stepped over the door threshold. In terms of physical injury, it’s definitely counts among Patrick’s worst experiences, together with the time some woman from the Irish mob tried to gut him with a knife. He remembers dropping his own gun from the shot, nearly falling to his knees, while Oliver yelled something about someone’s mother and more Italian profanities.

They’d killed the guy, of course. Oliver had pressed the gun into Patrick’s left hand, the right one dangling uselessly at his side, and Patrick had shot him. It hadn’t been clean, couldn’t have been, with Patrick two seconds away from passing out. He could have eased the shop owner’s pain with a second shot, but Patrick hadn’t been feeling particularly merciful, then. He’d turned around, and Oliver had helped him back to the car instead.

Patrick’s collarbone is all fucked up now, because the bullet chipped the bone. It still hurts when the weather is cold, at times. And while Patrick doesn’t regret murdering that guy, whether he’d been cornered and desperate or not, he doesn’t think that that’s a story he can tell Jonny.

“Remember two years ago, when Obama came to visit for a chat with Mayor Dayley?” Patrick asks, spinning the lie right out of thin air. “And there was an attack on the building? I was there, on security, yeah.” He Patrick runs his hand along Jonny’s naked arm again, soothing. “Got shot, but the guy got taken care of before anyone else could get hurt.”

There wasn’t actually an attack in 2010, as far as Patrick is aware, but the presidential visit is something he remembers well, for how it had moved the police to clean through the streets a lot more thoroughly than usual. They’d driven a lot of the mob’s dealers off their corners in the week preceding the visit, on top of moving the homeless. Something about good impressions.

Either way, Patrick counts on Jonny not being up to date with crime from two years ago enough to doubt Patrick’s words. Especially when Patrick has made sure to phrase this like it’s something that he could expect Jonny to know. Most people don’t like getting pointed out to them that they’re unaware of something that is common knowledge.

Jonny looks at him with a frown, like he’s more concerned about Patrick getting hurt than the details of the supposed attack anyway. Or the fact that Patrick claims to have done security for a presidential visit. It’s not like it’s the most dramatic lie that Patrick has fed him.

“Fuck, that’s crazy,” Jonny says honestly, flattening his palm over Patrick’s clavicle. “I’m glad you are okay.”

“I’m all good now,” Patrick promises, squeezing Jonny’s hand once. Then he grins. “I’m one tough nut to crack, baby.”

It’s not Patrick’s only visible scar. There is another one between Patrick’s belly button and his waist, from the attempted gutting incident, that has faded better than the gunshot wound. Probably because there’s no black ink there to stand out against. The one on Patrick’s thigh, Jonny hasn’t seen at all yet. And as much as Patrick enjoys making up stories, he won’t draw attention to them. He’s honestly had enough scrutiny on his body for one night.

Jonny looks at him, face still shadowed, so Patrick taps his fingers straight against Jonny’s sternum and smiles a little. Gives Jonny a short kiss. He wants to learn about Jonny’s scars instead, and then, maybe he can put a shirt back on.

“What about you,” he asks, “with your big scars? There’s gotta be a story there too.”

Jonny drops his hand from Patrick’s shoulder to look down at himself instead, letting out a small laugh.

“This?” Jonny follows the scar in the middle of his chest with his own fingers, from his collarbone down to his navel. “It’s from open heart surgery I had when I was eight weeks, when I was two, and when I was eight. And this one-” He takes Patrick’s hand, leading it to the scar that starts under his arm, circling towards his shoulder blade. “I had a thing called PDA. It’s where the two arteries, the aorta and the pulmonary artery are still connected after birth. They are supposed to separate hours or latest days after birth, but-” He shrugs a little, smiling down at Patrick, “mine didn’t. Which was a problem because basically it causes strain on your lungs and heart and if those are already failing, you can’t have that, so the doctors went in and fixed it.”

Patrick’s hand is still resting on Jonny’s side, held by Jonny’s, and Patrick watches on, fascinated. He had guesses already that Jonny’s scars were surgical, but they’re older than he would have guessed. Jonny was a baby when he’d gotten operated on like that. Patrick can’t even imagine how difficult such a surgery has to be, on such a small thing.

It’s strangely intimate, too, making Patrick want to splay his fingers over Jonny’s skin. Jonny is warm, despite the general coolness of the kitchen, and part of Patrick is getting distracted by how Jonny is just putting Patrick’s hand wherever he likes. It’s not a course of action Patrick is generally opposed to.

“And this here,” Jonny continues, leading Patrick’s hand to a spot on his stomach near his belly button where there’s a small, almost invisible line, that Patrick has to look for to spot. Patrick is also more than a little aware of how close his hand is to Jonny’s dick. “That’s from a g-tube I had as a baby. For artificial feeding. And this here-” Jonny leads Patrick’s hand up again, to his forearm where there’s a pale faded scar, a smile curling at the corner of his mouth. “This is from my brother David fucking up with his fishing rod when he was ten and getting the hook stuck in my arm instead of a fish.”

Jonny’s eyes are twinkling, and Patrick barks out a laugh. This is not where he had expected Jonny’s explanation to go. He runs his thumb over the scar, grinning up at Jonny.

“Your brother sounds like a man to be feared,” he jokes.

Then he gets on his tiptoes to kiss Jonny. He licks into Jonny’s mouth, actually, properly kisses him, and when he leans back, his body is humming with a want that is less arousal, and more general happiness with Jonny’s presence. The warm look that Jonny gives him in return only serves to make the feeling spread. Patrick grins dumbly, letting his hand drop to Jonny’s hip, their chests still pressed together. It’s good that Jonny is producing so much body heat, because Patrick himself is starting to feel cold, here.

“So I’m assuming you spent a lot of time in hospitals as a kid?” he asks, brushing his thumb over Jonny’s hipbone. Jonny hums contently. “Is that why you wanna be a doctor?”

“Well, a couple of my doctors are still on my mom’s Christmas card list,” Jonny answers with a grin. “So yeah, you could say I spend a lot of time in the hospital. That’s what happens when you are born 14 weeks too early. My mom calls me her miracle baby.” He leans in, stealing a kiss from Patrick’s lips. “Got me all figured out, eh?”

“’Course I do.”

He does it again, allowing it to last longer this time. Patrick is only too happy to part his lips for him and kiss back, especially with the way Jonny sucks his bottom lip between his teeth. Still, he’s starting to think that they could head back to Jonny’s room so there’s no risk of TJ walking in on them making out.

“I’m the cliché story,” Jonny says once he’s satisfied, leaning back again. “I want to be a doctor because doctors saved my life and I want to do the same for other people.” He shrugs a little, tracing one hand up Patrick’s arm and shoulder to eventually cup his face, tilt it to the side so Jonny can kiss his neck better. Patrick lets out a breath, heat spreading in his belly, listening out for footsteps at the same time. “Good thing I’m okay with being a cliché, if that means I get to help people while doing so.” Jonny laughs a little. “Or maybe that’s just another cliché, I don’t know.”

“Nothing cliché about wanting to save people,” Patrick breathes. “Like I said, lives being ruined every day. You’re probably going to find someone who’ll ruin someone else’s day a lot easier than someone ready to make an effort to help.”

Jonny grins, mouth finding Patrick’s neck again, because Jonny totally has a helping people kink, and Patrick bets that he just got reminded of Patrick’s supposed charity job. It makes Patrick shiver in the cold air, with the pleasure of it, and he lets out a frustrated noise, torn between wanting Jonny closer and his discomfort with their location. He’s got a semi already.

“Jonny, TJ-“ he says, hooking his thumb in the back of Jonny’s briefs to tug back a little.

“What about him?” Jonny asks petulantly, looking up with a pout that makes Patrick laugh despite himself.

“You dumb exhibitionist,” Patrick says fisting his fingers into Jonny’s hair to pull him in for a short kiss.

When he pulls back, Jonny’s eyes are serious. “You want to go to my room?”

Patrick nods, smiling apologetically. There are definitely ways he can indulge Jonny’s taste for getting looked at, but this is not one of them. He’s sort of at his limit here. Maybe he can get Jonny to cover him with his body to remedy that. As much as Patrick likes to run his lips over Jonny’s skin, he’s more than a little open to Jonny touching him in return.

Their leftover carrot sticks stay abandoned on the kitchen counter.

He knows that if he goes back to Jonny’s room, he’s not leaving it for at least another hour, but it’s the direction they’re headed anyway, and it’s not like Patrick has anywhere to be right now. It’s late, it’s becoming less and less likely that Jason would just drop by Patrick’s place. Patrick thinks he can chance it, for now. Especially when Jonny takes his hand to lead him back to the bedroom, taking away the need for Patrick to make himself put a foot in front of the other.

Jonny closes the door behind them before turning back to Patrick with a smile. “Better?”

“Much better,” Patrick admits, feeling some tension bleed from his shoulders just from being back in a closed space. He steps towards Jonny, laces both arms around Jonny’s neck so he can kiss him. “Now where were we, mister?”

“Mh,” Jonny says with a smile, pressing himself closer to Patrick. “Well I’ve got a march to go to early tomorrow, so if you wanna do something-“ He reaches between them to brush his fingers over the scar on Patrick’s side, like he knows that it’s there after all. Patrick will have to come up with a story eventually. “-say it now.”

“I see,” Patrick says teasingly, lifting his face up to kiss Jonny again. He wants Jonny between him and the world. He wants to be _good_. “Well I was going to suggest that you should fuck me, but if we don’t have the time…”

He trails off, watching how Jonny’s eyes darken. Jonny had said he was flexible the other day, and Patrick doesn’t seem to have been wrong in his assumption that Jonny would be into it, whether he likes to get fucked or not. The hardness that presses into Patrick’s thigh definitely confirms that theory.

“I think we have the time for that,” Jonny says, letting his hand drop to the dip of Patrick’s back, and down to his jeans.

“Good,” Patrick grins, pulling Jonny back towards the bed.

He doesn’t get to put his shirt back on, ends up wearing less clothes than before, even, but he does succeed in his attempt at getting Jonny to cover him, trapping him between his bulk and the mattress, and it’s good.

Jonny kisses Patrick until Patrick feels settled back into his skin completely, and when Jonny gets his fingers inside Patrick, it’s familiar in a way that fucking Jonny hadn’t been. Patrick knows how to react, how to play along.

In a way, it messes with Patrick’s head. His body is conditioned to a certain type of reaction that, no doubt, are enough to convince Jonny, but Patrick still tries to free himself from, because when he sees Jonny’s concentrated, flushed face as he tries his best to make it good for _Patrick_ , he can’t not. He has to go against his instincts, the ones shaped by 5 years of getting fucked by the same man. Even if nothing about it is like sex with Jason, and Patrick doesn’t want it to be. This is supposed to be good, _feel_ good. It’s theirs, and Patrick doesn’t want Jason anywhere near it.

He goes silent at first, repressing over-the-top moans, watching Jonny with wide-blown eyes, lips slightly parted. It makes Jonny give him worried glances, though, so when Jonny gets his cock inside of him, panting, and so, so beautiful, Patrick switches tactics.

“Jonny,” he moans, and then again, “Jonny, Jonny, Jonny,” like it’s the only thing he knows how to say.

It’s the only thing that he _wants_ to say. He keeps his voice down, because TJ is in the room right next to them, but it seems to do it for Jonny anyway. It’s what hottest about this, has been from the very beginning. How into him Jonny is, how much he reacts to Patrick, gets hot from it being good for Patrick, and there’s nothing fake in the way Patrick digs his fingers in Jonny’s back to pull him closer, back arching into Jonny’s touch. Even the memory of Jason touching him fades away. Because Jonny does feel good, Jonny does make him like it, even if Patrick hadn’t been sure that he could.

He comes with his lips latched onto Jonny’s throat and Jonny’s fingers around his cock, and Jonny follows suit only seconds after, collapsing on top of Patrick.

They fall asleep like that, limbs tangled into each other, and for once, the only thing on Patrick’s mind is Jonny.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter warnings:**  
>  \- Mention of criminal activity that Patrick participated in, including human trafficking (very briefly) and murder  
> \- Sex between Jonny and Patrick in which Patrick gets caught up in his own head and ends up faking it more than he's enjoying himself for most of it  
> \- Internet stalking


	7. Chapter 7

****Patrick lets Jonny check his wrist when he’s finally able to take off the brace, six weeks after first putting it on. He could go to see Abby, and he nearly does, but the reminder that he’s fucking a med student on the regular is enough to deter him. Maybe he can avoid going back to the hospital for as long as this thing with Jonny lasts.

“Doesn’t hurt at all,” Patrick lies brightly, twisting his wrist around experimentally.

It doesn’t really hurt that badly anyway. It’s closer to a twinge, like the wrist is a little sensitive after being suffocated for air and movement for six consecutive weeks. Patrick is just glad that he’s allowed to use both of his hands again. He’s sure that the leftover ache will pass in a couple of days, when he’s gotten used to independent movement again. Jonny seems satisfied with the way things feel when he runs his fingers over Patrick’s wrist, too, which has to mean that things are fine.

They celebrate with beer, and afterwards, Patrick takes infinite pleasure in using both of his hands to get Jonny off, until Jonny is moaning about Patrick’s hands and coming all over his stomach. Jason has the same idea, celebrating Patrick’s recovery by taking him to a fancy restaurant where he gets to cut his own steak like a big boy, and then making him fuck himself while Jason watches.

Out of the two celebrations, there is not a single drop of doubt concerning which is the one that makes Patrick most happy. Patrick gets a side by side comparison, even, thinking of his fingers inside Jonny while they’re inside of his own ass, being looked at when he’d much rather do the looking, playing a different part in both. It’s not a good look for Jason. Patrick is starting to get used to that.

His body decides to prove all the rules wrong by refusing to sleep despite the alcohol, two orgasms, and heavy meal of the night, because that’s the way of things, sometimes. In the morning, Patrick celebrates his recovery, all on his own, by changing the bedsheets. It’s satisfying as fuck. When he tells Sharpy about it, Sharpy makes fun of him.

“That’s your highlight for getting your brace removed? Changing your bedsheets?”

“Yeah, you try living alone with just one hand, and you can come back to mock me,” Patrick says snottily.

Sharpy rolls his eyes. “You could have hired a maid.”

“I don’t waste money like that, _excuse me_.” 

Patrick needs money to send to his family. He keeps enough for gas and food, sure, but not for a fucking maid. Being a mobster doesn’t instantly make you a millionaire, whatever people might think. He’s still paying back two sets of student loans, too – Erica’s and Jackie’s, who only just started studying. And now that Erica is about to get married, he’s going to have to try and save some more, just to make sure that she gets the wedding of her dreams. He can deal with messy bedsheets for two months, next to all of that.

“Yes, yes, you’re a cheap bastard. Then get a girlfriend,” Sharpy says, grinning. “So you don’t have to live alone.”

“Sounds about right,” Patrick laughs, easy.

That’s what a lot of women who are involved with men in the mob are reduced to – doing laundry, cleaning the house, making babies like delivery services, all sorts of fun things. At least Abby doesn’t have to live like that, and gets to have a decent job for herself. If Patrick ever has to marry a woman to keep up appearances, he hopes that he won’t have to relegate her to unpaid house maid either.

Sharpy flicks Patrick in the arm. “Don’t be crass.”

“I would never.”

Patrick sticks his tongue out at Sharpy. They both know that he would, obviously, because Patrick says a lot of things that he doesn’t mean.

He wonders if this is the moment that he should bring up Jonny. Given that Patrick has spent a little too much time with Jonny lately, and that he’d rather not stop, he’s thought about different ways he could use to cover things up. Telling Sharpy that Jonny is a girl that Patrick is seeing? That’s actually on top of Patrick’s list in terms of believable excuses. He’s feeding Jonny the lie that Jason is Tara, it would only be fair to give that role to Jonny in front of the other people in Patrick’s life too.

“Actually-“ Patrick says, grinning confidently. “I _have_ been seeing this girl-“

He’d considered telling Jason the same thing, at first, but it’s a thought he had quickly discarded. In all of Patrick’s time in the mob, he hasn’t dated a single woman, hasn’t even fucked one. He’s kissed a dozen at least, usually in front of coworkers, because it’s enough when you’re 23 and nobody expects you to settle down yet.

If Patrick really were to start “dating” a woman – and he would have to tell Jason it was for pretend, of course – Jason would want to know everything about it, and all the ways that Patrick let himself be with her. It’s not a viable solution for Patrick’s current situation. A fake girlfriend would not withstand a background check from Jason, and getting a real one would nullify the entire point of doing so in the first place – namely covering up for the time Patrick spends with Jonny.

“Since when?” Sharpy asks, one eyebrow raised, but grinning too, like it’s good news.

“Not the hockey night _you_ took me to, that’s for sure.”

“That’s preposterous, I set you up with three different girls and you turned them all down,” Sharpy protests, grinning widely.

Patrick scoffs. “I think we remember the night very differently.”

“That’s just because you were drunk.”

Sharpy is just making shit up, of course, because that’s what they do. The night they’re talking about is the one Patrick blew Jonny in a club bathroom, and he’d been gone for way too long for Sharpy to set him up with anyone. Patrick shakes his head in amusement.

“Guess you caught me,” he drawls. “It’s one of those girls. The second one, with the huge rack. She actually slipped me her number, and the next day, I figured I’d call her to, you know, get some action.” Sharpy nods very seriously, lips pressed together like it’ll somehow keep his laughter in. Patrick leers at him. “I’m telling you, she knows how to use those assets of hers in bed. And she’s always asking for more. Just yesterday-“

“Okay, okay, that’s enough,” Sharpy says. “I don’t even want to know if you were about to make everything up or describe real sex you have with your girlfriend. What’s her name?”

“Tara,” Patrick says promptly. “I met her at the gym.”

Given that he goes three to four times a week, he actually does regularly have conversations with people there. Patrick likes learning about all the different lives of the people around him – even the civilians. He imagines that straight people ogle each other at the gym as much as he’d like to ogle some of the men that go there sometimes.

“And you’re actually _dating_ her?”

“Yep,” Patrick confirms, popping his ps. “She’s cute, she knows some Italian, has no fucking clue that I’m in the mob. All sorts of good stuff.”

Sharpy raises an eyebrow at that last piece of information. Given that his own wife works for the mob too, now, he probably can’t imagine what it’s like to keep both worlds so entirely separate anymore. It makes Patrick wonder how it must have been, for Abby Sharp to find out that the man she was with was actually a criminal. She was won over in the end, of course, but still. Patrick might ask her about it one of these days. He can always use Tara as an excuse for inquiring.

“Well,” Sharpy says, marking a pause. “Good luck with that.”

 

~~~

 

“I told Sharpy that I have a girl,” Patrick tells Jason later.

They’re alone in Jason’s office. Most of the noises outside the door are people heading home to their families, and soon, the building will be near-empty. The mob might not have real work hours, but people still only stay in late if they have projects to finish on. Like the Rosati arms deal, that is now well and concluded. Jason just briefed Patrick on the call he had with the Rosati family, who seem satisfied with the quality of their products, despite the difficulties they had in the beginning.

At Patrick’s words, Jason looks up from his notes to give him a surprised look. Patrick has his legs in Jason’s lap, sitting in a chair next to him and using his hold on Jason to balance on the feet of his chair. He knows that it irritates Jason, and it’s half why he hasn’t stopped. He tilts his chair back precariously, head thrown back and eyes on Jason teasingly.

“A girl?”

“Yep,” Patrick confirms, rolling his head to ease some of the tension from his neck. “He’d been getting suspicious about never seeing me hook up anymore, and frankly, I don’t really like picking up girls in bars just for show, so I made up a girlfriend. Tara. Met her at the gym. Half Italian.”

The look Jason gives him is calculating, but after a few seconds he seems content with what he finds. “At least she sounds like she might be worthy of us. Italian blood is the only thing that _you’re_ lacking for this job.”

Patrick grins. “I know. I’m a disgrace.”

“You are.” Jason squeezes Patrick’s ankle painfully to signify Patrick that he wants to get up. Patrick resists a few seconds, smirking, before lifting his feet off Jason’s lap and allowing him to get free. “If you ever need someone to play the part at an event, I’m sure we can find someone willing to be paid for it. Now scoot, I have a family to go home to.”

“I thought I was your family,” Patrick says, cocky.

The fact that Jason is suggesting to hire a beard to solidify his lie comes as somewhat of a surprise, but it’s a good one. It means that Patrick should be safe in terms of whatever image he presents to his colleagues.

As for Jason, well. He still hasn’t found out about Jonny, and Patrick plans to keep it that way. He’ll just keep circling through friends, work, and activities as excuses for not being where Jason expects him to be, and now he might even be able to argue that he needs to do those things so that no one becomes suspicious. He can’t live purely at work and Trump tower if he’s supposed to come across as having a girlfriend, after all.

“Pets aren’t family,” Jason says, sounding vaguely amused too.

“You wound me, boss.”

Jason huffs out a laugh, but he also comes to lean down in front of Patrick’s chair so he can catch Patrick’s mouth in a kiss. Patrick immediately wraps his arms around his neck, aiming for pleased, slipping Jason some tongue. It’s with a chuckle that Jason steps back again.

“Don’t worry, I’ll find some time for you too.”

“Before the week-end, hopefully,” Patrick pouts.

He has a part to play, after all. Pretending to have a girlfriend to his friends is one way to cover up his involvement with Jonny, yes, but they’re not the most dangerous. What Patrick needs is for Jason to never, ever doubt him, so he doesn’t start to go digging around. Jason needs to think that Patrick is fucking whipped for him. That he wouldn’t even _want_ to be with anyone else at this point.

 

~~~

 

With the warmer months of summer comes a time where Jonny has to fly back to Canada, to see his family and spend some time with them. There’s a marathon he wants to run in Winnipeg that he’s been training towards in the last few weeks, and he’s reached a satisfying amount of data for his doctorate research – enough that he can afford to truly close off his semester, instead of continuing to work on thesis data collection after his exams.

In the time between his exams and leaving, Jonny has been keeping himself busy with marches, demos, volunteer work, training for his marathon. And his doctorate of course. Jonny is supposed to graduate next year, and he’s incredibly serious about his thesis preparation, because Jonny is someone who only ever sets the highest goals for himself.

And Patrick knows all this because he’s seen it happen. He’s followed Jonny’s progress with his research, has run with him a couple of times, even, and the only times Jonny ever brushes him off for something is when he’s busy trying to make the world a better place. It’s nearly enough to make Patrick feel like he’s a terrible person, for doing the work he does when Jonny – his friend? Fuckbuddy? – uses his free time to help out at a children’s clinic. Mostly, he just laughs at Jonny’s earnestness and then sucks Jonny’s dick a little as a reward for all the hard work he does.

It’s a problem.

They’ve known each other for over three months now, if you discount anything previous to 2012, and Patrick is up into his neck in Jonny’s business. He stays over up to twice a week. They hang out at Jonny’s apartment, they play video games. Jonny even cooked for Patrick once, when he’d admitted to having skipped a meal during the day. Patrick avoids doing that sort of thing, usually, but he’d been too busy preparing and refiling all the necessary paperwork for an inspection at Showtime. The inspection had gone well enough, the inspector noting that their budgeting left something to be desired without picking up on anything fishy.

Spending time with Jonny is more fun than Patrick has allowed himself in years, especially when he can complain about the dumb inspector with her dumb uptight bun and pursed lips, making Jonny laugh, making himself feel a little more like Pat – the Pat Jonny thinks he’s hanging out with, not Patrick himself – is a real, tangible person, with a job he’s allowed to talk about, who doesn’t just exist when he has his dick up Jonny’s ass. As much as Patrick loves that part too.

It’s all working towards the huge crush that Patrick is developing on Jonny and that he tries to ignore most times. It makes him be a lot more forward towards Jason, too, like he can somehow compensate the mistakes he’s making by convincing Jason that their passion is somehow rekindled – more than in the past years, where they would maybe fuck a couple of times a week, and just treat each other as colleagues the rest of the time, with a few kisses exchanged.

And Jason seems pleasantly surprised by it, coming over nearly every time Patrick asks for him, initiating sex with him, like he got reminded that he did, in fact, have someone that he genuinely enjoys fucking and who he’s in love with. They’ve been together for over five years, but he clearly still likes having Patrick ride his cock, just like he likes taking Patrick out to fancy restaurants and buying him things again. Patrick gets a watch from Jason one evening, just like that, and it’s the first time Jason has gifted him anything outside of his birthday for _years_.

Patrick kisses him for it of course, says I love you and deep throats his cock like a good boy, and while all of it comes easily, because it’s what Patrick is used to, it still feels jarring inside his chest, different from who Patrick would want to get on his knees for.

It also means Patrick is having a _lot_ of sex.

There are a lot of round twos with Jonny, because Jonny likes getting fucked after he’s come. Patrick trying to compensate the sex he’s having with Jonny with sex with his boss makes it a lot harder to fake enthusiasm sometimes. If Patrick is already getting all the sex he needs – good sex, sex he thoroughly enjoys with someone he genuinely likes – then whatever attraction he has for Jason is left to be faked. It’s not like when Patrick used to fill whatever loneliness he was feeling with Jason’s touch. He doesn’t feel lonely right now. And there are days where his sex drive is struggling to catch up.

(Only with Jason. Only ever with Jason. Sex with Jonny is like flying.)

He doesn’t think that Jonny realises exactly how much Patrick is sleeping with his “girlfriend”, when he seems to have more or less accepted the fact that Patrick is gay and clearly doesn’t care for this girl he keeps cheating on. Patrick is just glad that Jonny knows he’s taken. It sets a limit on what they’re doing, makes it impossible for Jonny to ask for more, even if he sometimes looks at Patrick in ways that make Patrick think that he might like that. It makes Patrick’s stomach do flips. It’s impossibly dangerous.

The summer holidays, in that sense, are a godsent. When Jonny leaves for Winnipeg, Patrick is going to break things off with him again. It’s simple, it’s the most natural way of ending things, and there is no way around it. Not when Jonny grins like he’s won a prize every time he gets Patrick to tell him anything about himself, and it makes Patrick’s stomach erupt with butterflies. Not when Jason tells Patrick that he’s glad for Tara, for the fake girlfriend character, because it means that he doesn’t have to whore Patrick out to random girls anymore, and he much prefers it this way.

“Because you belong to me,” Jason says, looking satisfied.

“Only you,” Patrick lies.

He tries not to think about what Jason might do to him if he found out about Jonny. Not when his interest in Patrick has just been rekindled by Patrick’s efforts.

And then there’s the weed.

Patrick is lying on Jonny’s bed, minding his own business – his and Jonny’s, given that Jonny is lying on top of him and kissing him silly – when TJ barges in, some time in early July, flinging a small bag of something at Jonny’s head, where it bounces off, landing softly on Patrick. Patrick slips the hand he had up Jonny’s shirt out immediately, propping himself and Jonny up on his elbows.

His breath stops in his throat, eyes glued to the bag.

“Quit slutting it up in front of the children,” TJ says from the doorway, arms crossed, a grin on his face. For some reason, the plants that litter this place are commonly called children by both TJ and Jonny. Usually, Patrick finds it more than a little amusing. “Get out your apron Jonny baby, it’s time to get baking.”

There’s nothing amusing about the bag on the bed next to Patrick. Because it’s weed. It’s a bag full of weed, and of Patrick doesn’t even know why he’s surprised. TJ and Jonny are college students, they must have come in contact with recreational drugs at some point in their studies. From what experience Patrick has had with college students, soft drugs are about as common as alcohol is. And Jonny being the hippie that he is, between his YouTube shit, gluten-free food and activism, of course weed would fit the picture.

If Patrick is honest with himself, he just hadn’t expected either TJ or Jonny to take any of it home, not after being here semi-regularly for the past three months. He’s let himself be lulled into safety by familiarity. By now, TJ doesn’t even side-eye him anymore, too used to seeing Jonny and him wrapped up in each other whenever he walks into the living room. Of course, sometimes he walks in on them in Jonny’s bedroom too, like now, because he has no concept of privacy.

Patrick thinks that this has to be the first time that he’s this close in contact with any sort of drugs since his crack lung in 2009, because Jason has made sure that he wouldn’t do any drug-related jobs again.

“The fuck are you talking about?” Jonny mumbles, throwing TJ a glare as he sits up, picking the baggie off Patrick’s chest. He eyes it. “What’s this?”

“Courtesy of Willy and Burky,” TJ says, still grinning.

Patrick has no idea who either of these people are, but Jonny seems to, because he proceeds to frown at TJ while Patrick sits up properly on the bed, straightening his shirt.

“Willy and Burky are gifting us weed? Why?”

“Well, they are throwing a goodbye party for Latts since he’s dropping out after this semester, and they are big fans of your brownies, so…” TJ wiggles his eyebrows. “I said you’d make them for the party tomorrow and in return you and I get to keep some for ourselves. What do you say?”

Jonny is a good cook, Patrick knows that. He even promised Patrick to bake him something before he leaves for Winnipeg next week. Except that the deal here, apparently, is that Jonny is going to bake weed brownies for a party full of people, while Patrick hangs around the apartment awkwardly and tries not to puke from the way his stomach seems to have opened up into an empty pit.

He can’t quite stop himself from glancing at the bag, over and over, mind stuck on the fact that Jonny apparently does drugs. It’s Ty and Jamie all over again. It’s not even a hard drug – just weed, just harmless fucking weed – but Patrick still feels like he’s been slammed into a wall, too taken off guard to take enough distance from it.

He doesn’t know if he was ever truly addicted to weed itself, but it doesn’t matter. It’s always been his gateway drug, has always led to more and worse and too much, until Patrick was floating and spinning down the drain like a piece of trash.

He has to force himself to smile, like he’s only mildly surprised by this turn of events. His palms are sweaty where they’re resting against his thighs.

“That something you guys do often?” he asks, gently mocking.

“Nah. Not Dr. Serious over here,” TJ answers flippantly. He nods to Jonny with a mocking frown on his face. “I get him to make brownies maybe twice a year but that’s it.” He throws Patrick a glance. “You are cool, right? Not gonna call the cops on me?” Patrick doesn’t get the time to answer before he’s already turning back to Jonny, eyebrows raised. “So are you gonna do it? If you don’t I have to give it back to Willy.”

Patrick lets out a relieved breath, pressing his eyes closed for a split second just to dissipate some of the tension. The weed is still there, still daunting towards the emptiness inside him, but it doesn’t feel quite as bad with the confirmation that at least Jonny doesn’t consume it often enough that he might become a problem to Patrick.

Of course, Jonny already is a problem for Patrick, just by virtue of being into Patrick and really fucking attractive. And smart. And kind. And good at singing.

“I mean,” Jonny hesitates, looking from Patrick to TJ and back. “I’m kinda busy here right now.”

Patrick paces his breathing, only listening to their conversation with half an ear, reminding himself that this is fine. He’s fine. The adrenaline that’s pumping through his veins is just a by-product of shock, and it’ll pass as soon as this whole episode is over. Sooner even.

“You can make them tomorrow morning,” TJ points out.

Patrick tries to push down the cravings.

“I’m going to the pro choice demo tomorrow morning,” Jonny says, frowning at TJ. “You said you’d come with.”

He pushes it down.

“Oooh right.” TJ pulls a face. “So no edibles then?”

Down.

With a sigh Jonny tosses the bag back at TJ. “Ask me again tomorrow, okay? Now get out of my room and fucking knock next time, would you?”

TJ mock-salutes at Jonny, winks at Patrick, and then he’s high-tailing back out of the room, closing the door behind himself yelling something about staying decent.

Patrick makes himself smile at Jonny, like he’s amused by his and TJ’s antics.

“You don’t have to, because of me. If you wanna bake brownies, I can watch. Or leave, or whatever.”

Right now, Patrick wouldn’t mind leaving, because it would at least allow him to clear his head, but at the same time, a small, defiant part of him _wants_ Jonny to ask him to stay. He wants to prove that he’s fine with this, completely and utterly fine. Patrick can watch his friend bake weed brownies and not feel the slightest pull of want, because he’s clean, and he’s stronger than this. Patrick won’t let something as harmless as weed force him into submission.

It’s also for the better if he stays regarding Jonny, because Patrick can’t have Jonny suspecting that he might have an issue with drugs. He doesn’t. He has a past, that’s all.

“But I don’t want to bake brownies,” Jonny says with a frown. “I’d much rather be kissing you.”

He switches to smiling, like he wants to coax Patrick into it, leaning in to press a kiss to the corner of Patrick’s mouth before going in for a kiss that lasts a little longer. Patrick melts into it. He laughs against Jonny’s lips, allowing himself to be pushed back onto his back, on the bed, while Jonny shows him just how nice it would be to stay here and make out. When Jonny pulls back, he tugs a stray curl behind Patrick’s ear, studying his face. Patrick smiles up at him, butterflies making his stomach tingle.

“Kissing you is quite nice,” he agrees, lacing his arms around Jonny’s neck to pull him down again.

The unease doesn’t quite leave until he goes back to Trump tower, but with Jonny pressed warm against him, Patrick thinks that maybe this really is fine after all.

Then he thinks that Jonny making him feel so good that he’s willing to ignore drugs being consumed next to him might not be a good thing after all, because Patrick is not supposed to have feelings for him. He can’t. Patrick’s life belongs to one man, until the day he dies or the day he becomes bored with Patrick, which might as well be the day _Patrick_ dies. One man, who made sure that Patrick would never be exposed to drugs again, because he doesn’t trust Patrick’s decision making when it comes to preserving himself.

It’s like the same song keeps being played over and over again inside Patrick’s head, a constant reminder that he can’t do this, shouldn’t, even if Jonny likes to say that Patrick can listen to _want_ too.

Jonny being so clearly infatuated with him should be a scary thought, not something that makes Patrick want to bury his face in a pillow and grin like doofus. And Patrick can’t hang around someone who consumes weed, even if it’s three times a year, even if Jonny told him that he can’t smoke it, because his lungs can’t take it. It’s Jonny’s premature birth factoring in again, making his heart and lungs too weak to carry either cigarette or weed smoke, so Jonny sticks to edibles when he wants to feel loopy, and TJ keeps his smoking to outside the apartment.

When the time comes for Jonny to leave, his plane departing in the early hours of the next day, Patrick fucks him twice in a row, hard enough that Jonny will feel it the entire time he has to sit in the airplane cabin. He leaves a row of hickeys along Jonny’s collarbone, like a necklace of bruises that make Jonny laugh at first, then moan.

“Don’t be a stranger,” Jonny tells him jokingly when Patrick drops him off at the airport.

Patrick smiles, and doesn’t answer anything.

 

~~~

 

_[From: Josh]_

_O Canada [attached picture of a boarding pass reading Canada, Winnipeg]_

_[From: Josh]_

_I told you there would be no snow. [attached picture of a sunny highway]_

_[From: Josh]_

_I’m so tired, I think I’m going to nap._

_[From: Josh]_

_Are you busy or something?_

_[From: Josh]_

_Dad and I are going fishing, so I won’t be reachable until the afternoon. I hope work isn’t too tough on you._

_Don’t skip meals!_

_[From: Josh]_

_I didn’t catch anything. But: [attached picture of Jonny in a boat with a bear in the background]_

_[From: Josh]_

_Pat?_

_[From: Josh]_

_Did I say something?_

_[From: Josh]_

_Okay._

 

~~~

 

Patrick tries not to cry over Jonny. He tries really fucking hard.

In the end, though, he fails miserably at even that.

It’s not like the last time, where he’d deleted Jonny’s contact entirely, together with their entire message history and ignored any further texts. It’s not like the last time, because Patrick doesn’t even mean to ghost Jonny. He means to answer Jonny’s messages with decreasing interest, until distance and lack of conversation starters from Patrick’s side discourage Jonny from trying any more. He means to make Jonny realise that he isn’t worth the effort.

When Jonny’s first text comes in, though, Patrick just turns off his phone and goes to work, burying himself in files and data sheets until he’s not thinking about Jonny anymore, and when he comes back to Trump tower, he only turns it on again to ask Jason if he wants to come over. It’s a mistake, because Jonny’s messages from the day come flooding in, making Patrick fingers twitch with the urge to answer. It’s even more of a mistake, because Jason turns Patrick down, and Patrick spends the rest of the night drinking at his kitchen table and waiting for the pain to go away.

Jonny doesn’t understand yet that Patrick is trying to distance himself from him, and it’s making the knowledge that they are over worse inside Patrick’s chest, festering like an open wound.

Patrick wanted to give Jonny a progressive withdrawal, but all he knows how to do is cold turkey.

After Jonny’s last message has been left unanswered for a week, Patrick makes himself delete Jonny’s contact information after all. He deletes the pictures, the selfie with the bear, the last pictures Jonny had sent him of his cooking at home, and any innocent pictures that Patrick saved, just because he couldn’t keep the sexy ones. Not when any of them would betray him to Jason.

Jonny looks happy in the pictures, and it only makes Patrick’s heart ache worse from the knowledge that what he’s doing now can’t be putting anything but a frown on his face.

Patrick cries in the bathroom, mostly. Under the shower, where he can slam his palm against the wall and feel the tears on his face mingle with the water that’s pouring down on his shoulders. It’s just one more dirty little secret, just like Jonny had been a dirty little secret, because admitting even to himself how heartbroken he is would be admitting defeat. Patrick being hurt by cutting off ties with Jonny after only three months of fucking (and talking and cooking and video games and hockey and-) isn’t good. It means that he cared, and Patrick isn’t supposed to care.

Patrick’s first and only love didn’t last much longer than three months either, he remembers. There had been drugs and then bankruptcy and then Patrick had had to remove himself from the situation – just like he had to do here. Patrick doesn’t think that you can fall in love this fast, not anymore, and the only reason thinking about Ty is such a bitter memory inside Patrick’s heart is that Patrick left it to rot behind walls he never takes down. Patrick isn’t stupid. He supposes that he will just have to do the same with Jonny and the infatuation and the heartbreak. Put it in its own little box, lock it up tight until it becomes so overgrown with time that nothing can come out of it anymore.

There’s a neat row of little boxes like that, in Patrick’s mind. Things that he locked up, chests that he stacks neatly into a corner. There’s an entire room of them, with dust and darkness covering the oldest ones. Erica’s chest gets opened every time Patrick gets a text from her, the hurt starting to recede every time, flaring up only on occasions that are too big to be contained. Jonny is just one more in a series of emotions that Patrick knows he can’t feel.

Patrick freezes everything together until he’s numb and none of it can seep through.

 

~~~

 

Patrick starts up a side project to keep himself busy. After all, if he managed to find the time to fuck around with Jonny, it means that he must have been slacking, and Patrick refuses to forget the goals he’s set himself. He wants to shine and impress, wants to rise in ranks and beat everyone else. He wants to be the youngest member to ever be named caporegime since Al Capone’s time. He wants to be the first purely American-born guy to do so. (Sharpy doesn’t count. He might be the first guy with no Italian heritage to become capo, but he’s not _American_.)

The pastor at the church Jason insists he go to says that ambition is a sin, but to Patrick, ambition is how he directs his life. Not for futilities like feelings and sex, but work, success, money. One day, Patrick won’t just have to feel on top of the world, because he will be. He will have a ring on each finger, gold chains around his neck, and his sisters will never go hungry a day in their lives again, even if they chose to lay down their work and live in luxury. Patrick is currently aiming for Jason’s position, but if he ever gets the chance, then he _will_ dethrone DiFronzo and take over. Everyone in the Chicago mob will answer to him, and Patrick will be the most powerful man in all of Illinois. Maybe he’ll think of strengthening his hold on more of America then.

Showtime gives Patrick the perfect platform to get where he wants, in this case, namely that of being a public person in the charity business. Patrick has no interest in doing petty jobs for the mob to fill his free time. What he needs to do is gain importance and rise above his station – which, here, means strengthening his political ties.

Jason is responsible for most of the mob’s weapons trade, while the other capos each manage a main branch – Sharpy does money laundering, Chara extortion, and Pietrangelo the drug business – but public relations are something that every high official needs to be involved in. You don’t become capo without ties in local politics. Even Chara, who is less locally connected, brings relations to international public figures that benefit the mob on top of DiFronzo’s portfolio of relations inside city management and the police. Patrick himself has relations inside both just from his proximity to Jason, because Jason like to take him along for business dinners and other pleasantries to make use of Patrick’s ease at defusing situations.

It’s not enough, though, and it’s not more than Jason yet.

“Shawsy,” Patrick says the next time he comes into the Showtime offices, slamming down both palms on Shawsy’s desk and causing him to flinch.

Patrick grins at him, shark-like.

“Uhm, yeah?” Shawsy says, looking like he’s still half-asleep and doesn’t quite know what has befallen him.

“Do you still have those plans for the charity gala? The ones I had you trash back in April?”

It takes a few seconds for Shawsy to fully compute with what Patrick is saying, but when he does, his face brightens immediately. “Oh!” He looks around his desk frantically. “The gala, right. Yeah, I should actually-“ He leans forward and starts pulling drawers open, filing through his rejected project ideas. There are a lot of them. “- have it right here…”

Patrick watches him with one expectant eyebrow raised. He’d put a stop on Shawsy’s idea as soon as he had seen it fly past him when Shawsy had first presented it to him, because too much exposure would only put Showtime in danger of being inspected a little too closely. They might be trying to attract more funds than just the money that is being laundered through it, but it still remains an illegal operation that could get Patrick into real trouble with the authorities. Depending on the amounts they get caught with, not even the mob’s lawyers could spare him prison time.

Patrick doesn’t think that a gala would endanger them anymore, though. The Showtime accounts were inspected just three weeks back without the inspector lady finding anything suspicious there to report them over. If the charity can withstand that close a look, it can only profit from gained exposure through a charity gala. Which means that Patrick can use Showtime not only for its initial purpose – the money laundering – but also in order to gain political traction for himself. He’s not quite a public figure in Chicago yet, but if he manages to have champagne with the right people through his own initiative, he might just get there.

“Ah, there,” Shawsy finally calls out victoriously when he gets his hand on the file he drew up. He hands it to Patrick, who skims it as Shawsy continues explaining “It’s mostly brainstorming we did with Lucy in terms of, like, general theme of the night and who we’d be trying to invite to the gala, not much more, but if you run it by Amelie she’ll probably know which option would serve us best-“

“Thanks Shawsy,” Patrick interrupts him, already going through options inside his head.

They’d want to make a charity gala to collect funds, obviously, but there could be a partial focus on thanking donators and schools that put in place some of Showtime’s programs. Patrick can’t only invite people he would like to build stronger ties to, but there’s a number of invitations that they’ll need to send out for the same of it, just under the chance that Mayor Emanuel or the head of Chicago’s biggest sports equipment company, Charles Travolta, have the time to attend a charity gala.

Shawsy is right on the point that Patrick is going to have to talk this over with Amelie, given that she manages their PR. Invitations aren’t just a matter of who you want there, they’re also a strong indicator for the charity’s public intentions. They need to work on the framing of the gala, and Patrick is going to have to calculate what sort of funds they can put in an event like this with their restricted budget, given that they can’t invest any mob money at loss.

He walks back to his office with his nose up in files and draws up a proper strategy for what he wants to do for the next three hours before setting out to delegate some of the tasks and discussing their options with Amelie.

He can’t help but think that a charity gala is the sort of thing that he’d like to take Jonny to, if he ever had the possibility. Jonny would puff up his chest like the proud little hero he is at the thought of doing something for Patrick’s charity. He would look good in a suit, too, Patrick is certain. With that ass of his, any slacks would be taunt over the hips and thighs, and he would make the most ravishing of arm candies. He could keep a hand on Patrick’s arm and charm people with his genuineness and good-will while they went to discuss Showtime’s projects with their guests, and-

Patrick swallows down the bile at the back of his tongue.

He’s never going to take Jonny to any work-related event. He’s never even going to meet up with Jonny again. Patrick is going to have to ask Jason about hiring a Tara instead and instruct her on how to behave during the night so he can make a good impression as a man with stable relationships and good taste in ladies. Afterwards, he will crawl back to Jason to prove to him that he’s still the only one for Patrick, and that no hired eye-candy could ever outshine him in Patrick’s eyes. And Patrick is going to hate it, but it won’t matter. Patrick’s personal feelings have never mattered less.

There’s a world of public relations to conquer, a network of favours to build, and leverage to gain so one day, he can get Jason either locked up or killed. Then Patrick will take it all from him. And he’ll laugh in Jason’s face as he does it, and remind him that after all, Patrick only ever took him up on his offer because he wanted to rise higher.

 

~~~

 

Patrick wants to organise the gala in August, because the sooner they do it, the better, but Amelie insists that it would not only result in a rushed event, but also in bad publicity. August is not a good month for local charity, unless they want to recruit international donors and tourists. Politicians are the kind of people who go to Cabo in August – or Hawaii, or France, or Tokyo, or Taiwan, she lists off, just to drive the message home. The attendance that they want won’t be there, is the point. Patrick remains stubborn on the issue for at least three more days before finally caving under the pressure of his entire office combined.

He doesn’t admit even to himself that hosting his own event in August might have had the added advantage of distracting him from Erica’s wedding. Patrick had wanted to be so busy he didn’t have a single braincell to spare outside of work. He still wants that, because work is the best kind of distraction from breaking his little sister’s heart on her most important day. She’s sent him his checks back before, and he wouldn’t be surprised if she sent back the money he plans on gifting her for the wedding itself either. Not that it matters, because in the end, he will just force her to take it. Her pride is the least of his worries.

They set the date for the gala in September, which is still soon enough to be a lot of work and require persuasion on Showtime’s part so they can get a good enough deal. It also turns out to be lucky for Patrick himself, because Jason informs him two weeks later that Patrick is going to New York City in a tone that would have admitted no buts and ifs. Patrick needs to meet with the Rosati head of family so that they can discuss a long-term partnership, while Jason stays in Chicago to deal with new sales trouble – in Chicago itself, this time.

As much as Patrick would like Showtime to be his main project to dedicate himself to, it’s not something that particularly impresses Jason. Money laundering is Sharpy’s operation, and there’s a good reason why Jason himself never touches it. Something to do with being too far away from the action and pretending that you’re not doing the dirty work for the mob. Patrick thinks that if Jason wasn’t gay himself, he would probably accuse Sharpy and his entire branch of being it, because this sort of activity is emasculating to him. All in all, this means that Patrick would never have been able to sit out on the New York trip to attend a _gala_.

Those are the first thoughts that go through Patrick’s head when he accepts the task, immediately starting a first briefing with Jason on what exactly will be their interests in that meeting, and what positions Patrick can and can’t budge on. Soon after, though, he realises that that means that he will be in New York state, closer to Buffalo than he has been in years. It will mean that if he does a small detour through Buffalo, it might seem a lot less suspicious than if he had straight-up left town to attend his sister’s wedding.

The thought follows him home, sticking to his skin more closely than Jason’s hand on the back of his neck, making him kneel. It makes him dizzy. It tastes like sandpaper in his throat, rough and irritating. He feels nauseous swallowing, because shit, he hasn’t seen his family in six years, and he doesn’t know if he’ll be strong enough to stay away. Jason wipes his come off the corner of Patrick’s mouth with a gentle hand, and Patrick has to pace his breathing until Jason is asleep in his bed and Patrick can get a beer out of the fridge.

Erica sent him the date and venue details for the wedding earlier this week, is the thing, and from what he remembers, the days don’t match up perfectly, but he’s also good at improvising. If it comes down to it, he could simply make up an excuse, or even find something that he could actually do in Buffalo for the mob. If there’s things to do in New York City, there will be things in the second largest city of the state, too, even if it’s just in order to form alliances.

He stares out of the window, drinking from his bottle and listening to the quiet noise of Jason’s breaths. It makes him think of Jonny, whose breaths are anything but quiet. Jonny is a mouth-breather, someone who you always know is there, in a reassuring sort of way. Patrick likes it a thousand times better than the silence of this condo, or Jason’s lack of noise. He swallows another gulp of beer down. Erica used to breathe pretty loudly too, when they were kids. They did room together for most of their childhood, and that small window of time when Patrick was 17 and staying with his parents again.

He had only just gotten used to the sound of Erica breathing at night before it had been time to move away again.

“You never sleep, it’s like you’re watching me,” he remembers her complaining. “It’s creepy.”

After that, he’d pretended to sleep even when his mind was wide awake during the night. Because back then, he would have done anything so that Erica wouldn’t be mad at him. He chews on his bottom lip bitterly, fingers tight around the neck of his bottle. Back then. Nothing like now, where Erica only ever _is_ mad at him.

Patrick wonders what cruel irony decided that he would have to go to New York city with the job he left his sisters for.

Jason, of course, waits until the last day before Patrick has to leave to fill him in on the last part of his mission – although mission is a word that sounds too much like he’s doing something good, something noble. Patrick is building alliances with New York’s biggest gang so that they can sell guns to them – guns imported from Ireland, because even though guns are supposedly legal and protected by lobbys in America, things are never that simple. And then there’s the second part of what he has to do.

“When you’re in New York, I want you to kill Alfonso,” Jason says smoothly, Patrick on the chair in front of his desk for once.

Patrick looks at him for a split-second, but Jason seems serious about this, so he shrugs.

“Okay.” He pauses, tilting his head to the side. “Why?”

Alfonso is one of Jason’s soldiers too. He was Patrick’s boss for the entire time that Patrick worked as an associate, dealing at street corners and being introduced to the mob. There are no lost feelings between him and Patrick, but Patrick knows that he’s valuable, and he has been working under Jason for at least a decade now. As cold and utilitarian as Jason can be about the lives of his subordinates, he wouldn’t kill Alfonso without a good reason. Jason isn’t someone who goes around killing everyone that crosses him.

“He told me that he wanted to move to New York,” Jason says pleasantly, like they’re chatting about the weather.

“Just move there?”

Jason smiles indulgently. Patrick takes that that means that Alfonso _didn’t_ just ask to move. Although Patrick can’t imagine how that conversation could ever be a viable option anyway. You don’t move away from the mob. You disappear, maybe, but you better be smart enough not to get caught. Defecting is something that equates to a death sentence with the mob, after all. Which are all things that Alfonso is very much aware of.

“He offered to act as a liaison between us and the Rosatis. From there.”

Patrick lets out a bark of laugh at that. “Like, he wants a transfer? To the Rosatis?”

As far as Patrick is aware, Alfonso already is in New York, doing just that, but on a more short-term basis. He must have asked to make the role permanent the last time he checked in with Jason over the phone.

Jason nods, propping his chin up on his folded hands, elbows on the huge desk that dazzled Patrick so much when he first came into this office. Now that he has spent so many hours in here, it has lost a lot of the same appeal, but Patrick still likes it for the power it illustrates. Sitting behind this desk makes you untouchable by anyone but DiFronzo.

“Yes. He wants to move with his family, supposedly. He’s lived in New York city before, back in his childhood. A little like you, actually.”

“Hey, I’m no New Yorker,” Patrick protests with a smile. “Buffalo’s not New York.”

It’s not far, though. Especially compared to the distance between Chicago and Buffalo. Going upstate from New York to, say, a wedding, is something that _could_ be done. Theoretically speaking.

“No, you’re not like him,” Jason says, and something in his voice makes Patrick look at him more attentively.

Jason isn’t quite smiling, but there’s a crook to the corner of his mouth that reveals at least an attempt at it. Outwardly, he seems as calm as Patrick has ever seen him, but he knows Jason. He knows this smile – the Mona Lisa smile, he likes to call it. And right now, Jason is beyond himself with anger. He radiates it from every muscle in his face, starting and finishing with the not-quite-smile. Patrick can’t help but admire Jason’s ability to appear threatening without ever losing his cool.

He leans back in his chair a little, certain now that Alfonso is dead. It’s only a matter of when and how, to be then carried out by Patrick.

“So, what did you find out when you looked into it?” he asks.

There is a story behind this, one that Jason has found out. Patrick doesn’t really need to know it to kill Alfonso, but it helps to know the offense, because he has to dose the punishment appropriately. Jason would not be satisfied with a short, clean death if Alfonso had really betrayed them, or if he was threatening Jason in some way. Not that that theory fits with Alfonso’s request to be moved to New York as a liaison.

Patrick wonders what it will be. He has never had to torture anyone himself, but he also knows how to make a death slow and painful if that’s what Jason wants. The distaste he might once have had for murder is something he has long gotten over. If there ever was a point of no turning back, Patrick doesn’t remember when he passed it.

“A woman.” It’s not a promising start for Alfonso, because women traditionally make men in the mob a lot more stupid than Patrick would expect them to be. It leaves him with consternation, most of the time. “His ex-fiancée, to be precise.”

“Ah,” Patrick says.

He’s disappointed in Alfonso, really. He respects him as a co-worker, even if they aren’t friends, and the thought of Alfonso throwing away his career and life over a woman doesn’t speak all that highly for him. Patrick doesn’t know what would be worse, it being an ex, too, or if it was a new relationship and decision-making born completely from passion and impulse. They’re both equally distasteful, and it makes Patrick briefly glad that he was never that stupid, at least when it came to his feelings. Patrick might not enjoy it, but he always knows when to call it quits. Leaving Jonny was the only right decision to make, just like leaving Ty had been.

“There’s been contact between the two of them over the past years,” Jason continues.

“Which is a bad thing, because…”

Jason smiles, crossing his hands over his stomach this time. Patrick can see the way his knuckles are blanching with tension, and he wonders why Jason is dragging out the conversation so much, making Patrick ask all the questions instead of immediately providing him with all the information. His guess would be that this is Jason using Patrick to reconsider exactly how grave Alfonso’s offense is, and how it is that he wants Alfonso to die exactly. Still, Patrick prefers not playing guessing games if he doesn’t have to.

“She’s part of the New York mob,” Jason says, and finally, it’s out there.

Patrick huffs out a breath. “Well that’s not good. And there’s been contact?”

“Nothing too compromising, of course,” Jason says, batting his hand like he’s waving away a fly. “We would have felt the effects if he had revealed too much to the Rosatis. But it’s a leak, and we can’t have that in our organisation.”

“Which means he has to be eliminated,” Patrick finishes the thought. He crosses his legs, eyeing Jason speculatively. “Okay, so, you want him to die. In New York. I can join him there and let him know that his services for us in Chicago have been terminated?” He smiles a little. “ _Alfonso_ , my man, I know you wanted to move to New York. After some consideration, the boss has decided that you’ve worked for us long enough. We know how to reward our loyal men. You don’t ever have to leave New York again.” He brings up both hands to his face, miming an overjoyed expression. “Thank you so much, Patrick, you’re the best,” he says in a falsetto voice. “And then-“ His face falls back to sarcastic, and he lifts his hand to mime cocking a gun at Jason. “Boom. Showtime over.”

Jason chuckles. “I’ll leave the details of it to you. Just make him call me once he knows that he’s about to die.” His smile widens, eyes dark and shining like he’s already imagining Alfonso begging. “But you have to warn Dean Rosati first,” he adds, suddenly all business. “So that no conflicts of interest arise. We’re only eliminating a weak link-“

“It has nothing to do with our trust in the New York organisation, yadda yadda, got it,” Patrick finishes, nodding to himself. “We’re not killing people in New York without the Rosatis’ permission. Okay. Consider it done.”

Jason smiles, and this time, it’s directed at Patrick. There is none of the anger that is reserved for Alfonso. When Jason looks at Patrick, it’s with a mixture of amusement, fondness, and pride that makes Patrick glow despite himself. He lives to please, after all.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter warnings:**  
>  \- Misogynistic talk  
> \- Unhealthy coping mechanisms  
> \- Drugs: mention of recreational weed consumption which is triggering for the MC  
> \- Murder: the MC is tasked to assassinate a co-worker


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you're worried about any mob-related topics, I would strongly advise checking out the detailed (spoilery) chapter warnings in the end notes.
> 
> This chapter doesn't have Jonny in it.

Dean Rosati is a man to be feared, Patrick learns when he presents himself to the man’s office with news about the leak between Alfonso and the New York woman.

“You’re the executioner?” Rosati asks once Patrick is finished with his explanation.

He’s not the sort of person who would enjoy Patrick’s brand of humour, Patrick doesn’t think, so he keeps his face blank of any emotion, like he has during the entirety of his report, and nods.

“Yes, sir,” he says coolly.

There’s a time and place for everything. If Dean Rosati wants professionalism above anything else, Patrick can give that to him as easily as he can be the outlet for Jason to bounce his ideas off on. Either way, there is always one thing that his superiors expect from him, and that is blind obedience.

“That’s good,” Rosati says, not the hint of a smile in sight. “Then you can take care of the woman too.”

Patrick blinks, waiting for a split-second to see if Rosati plans on giving him anything more than that. If he understood this correctly – which he thinks that he did, given that Rosati isn’t answering – Rosati wants him to kill Alfonso’s ex-fiancée too. Which would mean that he is authorising a member of another mob to execute someone from his own organisation. Patrick doesn’t think that he’s ever seen any sort of arrangement like this in Chicago. They always take care of their own murders. It’s considered an honour to do so, even.

“Yes, sir,” he says again. “With your permission of course. Do you have any preferences regarding the method?”

Rosati waves his hand like he’s batting a fly away. “No. She’s insignificant. But if she is a liability, then she needs to be dealt with. Just make sure the murder doesn’t get traced back to us.”

So Rosati doesn’t want the woman to disappear. He wants her death to be visible, most likely to set a warning for his other associates. Patrick nods shortly. He supposes that that explains why him doing it could be an advantage. It will be more difficult for the police to prove anything if the one pulling the trigger wasn’t part of the New York mob at all. Of course, Patrick can’t risk getting caught either, so he’ll have to figure out a way to make the death discreet. Maybe he can convince her to shoot herself. She might be the kind of person who prefers a quick death.

“It will be taken care of,” he tells Rosati. “I’ll be back in when it’s done.”

“Good,” Rosati says. The tone is final, which Patrick takes as him being dismissed. He gets up. “We’ll talk more about business once all this is settled,” Rosati adds.

“Yes, sir,” Patrick says, and this time, he allows himself a small smirk.

 

~~~

 

As it turns out, the woman does prefer a quick death to the other options Patrick offers her – throwing her off a high place, beating her to death in an alley, getting Alfonso to do it in exchange for his own life. Her face twists at that last proposition, and Patrick smiles at her calmly. To be fair, he isn’t particularly fond of those last two options either, because they require a lot more effort, and Patrick prefers his murders quick. He’s a guns kind of guy, not a hands-on one, and playing with lovers’ feelings is _not_ fun. Everyone just ends up crying and shouting. It’s messy. It makes it a lot harder to stay completely detached from the scene.

“I’ll do it,” she says, lips twitching.

“Good choice,” Patrick says fake cheerfully, clapping his gloved hands a couple of times. “Now I’d give you your gun back, but I don’t trust that you’re not gonna shoot me, so how about we rip some bedsheets so you can hang yourself?”

She makes a noise at the back of her throat, hands shaking. Her face is pale and drawn, staring at him with wide, dark eyes, and really, Patrick is impressed with her. Most people would be sobbing by this point. This woman has guts. She would probably be ranking a lot higher in her organisation if she wasn’t a woman, Patrick thinks. It’s too bad.

“Come on, get going,” Patrick says, gently this time as he pulls himself a chair so he can watch her prepare. He doesn’t leave her out of his sight one second. He sees her glance at the window and sighs. “Even if you managed to break the blinds, it’s the second floor, you know that that won’t kill you. And if you try to run I’m going to have to shoot you, and that’s going to be a lot less fun for the both of us.”

“It’d be faster than choking to death,” she says shortly.

“Mh, depends.” He tilts his head sideways. “I’m a pretty good shot, you know? I could blow your kneecaps off first, so you wouldn’t be able to run anymore, and then we’d move on to discussing what I’m gonna do with you. Since guns make everything so much more complicated. Do you think there’s anyone in your family or friend group I could frame?”

She looks at him, furious, but she also finally gets moving, stiffly picking up her bedsheets and quickly tying them in something resembling a hanging knot, clearly not inclined to discuss the ways in which he could frame gunshot wounds to avoid police attention on himself. Of course, too much digging into any mob person’s death can be bad for said mob, depending on how well the framing is done, but they’re just discussing options here. Patrick is good at presenting people options.

He crosses his legs, leaning back in the chair, and waits. The AC is cranked up to the maximum in the room, uncomfortably cold. Patrick wonders if it’s making tying the knots harder. Observing the woman, he’s pretty sure that she must have tied nooses like this before. Her hands are sure, despite the way the hairs stands up on her arms. He watches her tie the end of the noose in a knot that looks suspiciously like it would break under too much weight, and raises one eyebrow.

“Tighter,” he instructs.

She grits her teeth and does what she is told, like a good little soldier.

Patrick wonders what Jonny would look like in the face of death. If Jonny would act proud until the very end, like her, or if he would beg. If he would fight against Patrick, even knowing that it wouldn’t matter in the end, because he was doomed. Jonny spends so much time fighting, against the establishment, against injustice, that Patrick can’t imagine him resigning himself to death. No, he would make things difficult for Patrick, every step of the way.

Her head is held high as she steps on the chair and passes the noose around her neck. Patrick doesn’t break eye-contact until she’s kicked the chair away.

There is no way to be dignified in death.

As he watches the woman twist and shake, hands coming up to pulls at the cords squeezing her throat as if on instinct, Patrick tries to imagine Jonny in her place. It makes something shudder, deep inside him, and he has to close his eyes for a split-second.

Jonny is safe, now. He’s safe from Patrick and safe from Jason. And that’s all that matters.

When the woman is finally still, body hanging limply, he takes a moment to look into her slack face, until he has managed to push all thought of Jonny to the back of his mind again. The room already stinks of death and feces, despite the cold. She’s just another woman whose name doesn’t matter any more than her death. Clare Roberts. Jonny is just as insignificant as her. All that matters is a job well done, and Dean Rosati’s good graces.

 

~~~

 

Getting rid of Alfonso goes in no way as smoothly, partly because Alfonso isn’t there when Patrick goes to his hotel room.

It makes Patrick still in the doorway, the key one of the hotel’s staff so kindly gave him against a fifty still in his hand. There is no way that Alfonso could already have made a run for it. Patrick only just took care of the woman, but if he did, then Patrick is in trouble. In real trouble.

Patrick’s missions, in order of priority, are to look over the papers for a long-term agreement between the Rosatis and Chicago and bring it back to Jason; then kill Alfonso; then anything that Rosati might have given him to do on top of his first two missions. If the latter messed with the execution of the tasks Jason gave him, then Patrick is royally screwed, whether he can argue that doing jobs for Dean Rosati might help them with the first mission or not.

Of course, Alfonso might simply have gone out. Patrick did say that he would swing by Alfonso’s hotel room tonight, so Alfonso should be here, but Patrick had kept the invitation casual enough that Alfonso might think of their meeting as only semi-formal. It’s disrespectful as fuck, but then Alfonso met Patrick when he was eighteen, and he’s never quite grown to take Patrick seriously.

The empty room stares back at Patrick tauntingly.

Patrick shakes his head, before sitting down on the bed. If Alfonso is gone, there’s nothing Patrick can do to confirm it. If he isn’t, then there will soon be one less person underestimating Patrick in the mob.

 

~~~

 

Alfonso comes back half an hour after Patrick, a beer case under his arm.

Patrick looks up from his gun, where he had been checking whether the silencer was properly secured on top of it.

“You can drink, right?” Alfonso asks as he closes the door behind himself. “I always forget.”

It’s a chirp about Patrick’s age that, if Sharpy was the one to make, would make Patrick laugh, but right now only mingles irritation with the relief that Patrick feels at Alfonso’s return. This is just Alfonso being unprofessional, nothing more.

He gets up, sliding the gun back into the inside of his suit jacket, and gives Alfonso an easy smile, cocking his head in direction of the door.

“Actually, I’ve got something to show you,” he says smoothly, choosing not to address Alfonso making him wait half an hour. “Let’s go for a ride.”

“A ride? To where?”

Alfonso puts the beer case down on the table next to the door.

Patrick winks at him. “It’s a surprise.”

“Seriously?”

“Yep.”

Alfonso looks at him for a long moment, before letting out an aggravated sigh.

“This better be about the Rosati deal.”

Okay so maybe he respects Patrick a little bit. Enough to trust that Patrick isn’t going to waste his time, despite the way Patrick plays up the drama on pretty much everything. They _have_ worked together for five whole years, after all.

It’s too bad for him that this time, trusting Patrick is not going to end well for him.

“Let’s take your car,” Patrick says, grabbing a beer out of the case on the way out.

Patrick gives Alfonso a random address, ten minutes away from their final destination, just so Alfonso doesn’t start freaking too soon. He needs to be the one doing the driving so Patrick can draw his gun on him if it comes to it after all.

He chats Alfonso up on the way, too, sipping from his beer occasionally as he keeps an eye on him, reporting on his earlier conversation with Dean Rosati while omitting the details about killing both Alfonso and Clare. Instead, he tells Alfonso that Rosati has something that he wants them both to do, and that he’s going to understand as soon as they get there, wiggling his eyebrows obnoxiously as he does so. It’s effective in getting Alfonso both interested and pissed off at him, which is exactly how Patrick wants him. Like this, he’s less likely to suspect that Patrick wants something from him specifically.

“Actually, this isn’t where we’re going,” Patrick says when they turn into the street he initially gave Alfonso. “Continue straight ahead and then turn at the lights over there.”

The look Alfonso gives him is murderous. “Okay, no, that’s enough Patrick. Stop fucking around and tell me what we’re doing already.”

Patrick smiles, taking another sip from the beer. Then another. Until Alfonso has driven past the random house number Patrick picked out. It’s not like he can just stop in the middle of the street.

“Did you fuck up? Is that it?” Alfonso asks, clearly done with Patrick’s shit. “Because I’m not here to play chauffeur for you or fix your damn mistakes, and I’m going to walk right back out if I don’t want to go where we’re going.”

“Turn left after the pharmacy over there,” Patrick says, pointing at the big plus that lights up the side of the road.

“Fuck you, Patrick,” Alfonso says.

“Yeah, yeah,” Patrick says. “You just don’t know how to have any fun, that’s all.”

He can see that Alfonso is starting to get fidgety, and really, Patrick would be lying if he said that he wasn’t enjoying himself a little bit. He might not care for the murder part, but what he has planned is pretty fucking theatrical, and the fact that he’s just leading Alfonso around the nose right now has a satisfying edge to it. Alfonso might think that Patrick is a brat who’s playing games, but Patrick is actually successfully getting him where he wants him without needing to threaten him, and that’s not a given at all.

That much becomes obvious too once they start actually nearing the place, and Alfonso’s face gets stonier and stonier. He stops asking their destination, stops looking at Patrick entirely, like he doesn’t want Patrick to think anything is up on the off-chance that Patrick doesn’t already know about his relationship to Clare and this is all a big stroke of luck. Patrick gulps down the last of his beer, careful to never take his eyes off Alfonso’s shadowed face. He stops giving instructions once they’re a block away, and Alfonso drives them to the right house in silence.

“You worked with Roberts before?” Patrick asks, raising one eyebrow.

Two can play at this game.

“Occasionally,” Alfonso says. “It’s her we’re meeting up with?”

“Yeah,” Patrick says easily. The motor stops, and the car lights up. “I thought it was weird that she invited us back to her place. That’s her private address, right? Does she always do that?”

Judging from Alfonso’s face, it’s _not_ what she usually does, but they both know that he can’t say that and pretend that they’re not close at the same time. Patrick smiles at the way the tension bleeds into a tick in Alfonso’s jaw. He’s not the easiest person to read, but out of the soldiers that work for Jason, he’s still the most transparent. His jobs don’t require him to lie and put up fronts, usually. He manages their associates, mostly, and looks threatening when he has to.

“Yeah, I suppose,” he says.

It’s really too bad for him that Patrick is an expert at reading people, if he seriously wants to fool Patrick here.

“Let’s go in,” Patrick says cheerfully.

Alfonso doesn’t ask what this is about again as they get out of the car, shoulders squared and tense. Patrick sees his hands brush the back of his jeans, where his gun has to be hidden. He doesn’t doubt that Alfonso will put up more of a fight than the woman had.

Which is why, as soon as they close the apartment door behind them and a wave of cold hits them, brutal after the warm August air, even at night, Patrick shoots him.

Not in the head, because Patrick can’t have him die yet, but right in the back of the knee, where the kneecap is. Where he told the woman he would aim if she ran. Alfonso shouts, staggers for a split-second, and drops.

Immediately, he rolls onto his side, grabbing his gun out of the back of his jeans and pointing it at Patrick, but Patrick is faster. He shoots Alfonso again, aiming for the wrist this time. Alfonso’s gun falls out of his hands before he can press the trigger. There’s no silencer on Alfonso’s gun, and Patrick can’t risk attracting attention from any neighbours right now. He lunges for the gun.

Alfonso tries to do the same, knocking Patrick’s arm away with his bloody hand, despite the way the pain makes him bare his teeth, powered through and through by adrenaline. It makes Patrick’s own wrist flare up with the memory of the fracture three months ago, so Patrick punches him with his other hand, square across the face. Alfonso’s nose gives a satisfying crunch under Patrick’s fist, and Patrick grins, blood singing with the thrill of action.

“Stay _down_ ,” he orders, snapping the flat of his gun across Alfonso’s injured hand.

Alfonso lets out a howl of pain, trying to twist away from Patrick, and it’s enough for Patrick to finally secure both guns away from Alfonso. There’s red smeared over Alfonso’s bottom lip, from the broken nose. All remaining colour has drained from his face.

“Stay down,” Patrick repeats, “and I won’t have to kill you yet.”

“Fuck you,” Alfonso spits, and tries to lunge for Patrick.

Patrick gets knocked back this time, enough that Alfonso manages to roll them over on the floor and land a mean jab at Patrick’s ribs with his elbow. The pain is fine, but it makes a little too much air escape Patrick’s lungs. He gasps, shoving back at Alfonso once, twice, and kneeing him right in the crotch next. Alfonso growls, and Patrick follows up with another knee to Alfonso’s injured leg, making use of the advantages he has over him. Body strength certainly isn’t one of them.

The pain seems to be enough, though, because Alfonso rolls back with a pained moan, tears pearling at the corners of his eyes. Patrick follows the movement until he has his gun pressed to the underside of Alfonso’s chin. Finally, Alfonso stills.

“Stay. The fuck. Down,” Patrick enunciates for him with a grim smile.

Alfonso just stares back defiantly, which Patrick takes as assent. Breathing hard, he gets up, brushing his hair back with the hand that holds Alfonso’s gun and isn’t pointing his own at him. Patrick feels sweaty and there’s blood all over his clothes, which is not what he wanted, but he planned for this in case it happened, so he’s not too worried.

“Okay, good,” Patrick says. “We’re gonna call the boss now.”

“DiFronzo?” Alfonso asks shortly.

There’s a rapidly increasing pool of blood around him from the gunshot wounds, which means that Patrick is going to have to act quick if he doesn’t want Alfonso to bleed out. Of course, he does want Alfonso to die by the end of this, but he doesn’t know how long Jason wants to talk to him, and Jason wouldn’t be happy with Patrick if Alfonso bled out before he was done with him. So Patrick glances around critically for a second, looking for something to tie off Alfonso’s circulation with.

“You’re not that important, dude,” he says with an eyeroll. “Cirone. We’re calling Cirone. Now shut up and stay here, I’m going to get a belt so you don’t bleed out.”

“Fuck,” Alfonso just says, looking ready to try to run anyway as soon as Patrick has his back turned.

Patrick locks the apartment door twice, glances around once more to check that there are no windows in the hallway, and then gently puts his foot on the centre of Alfonso’s chest – not pressing down, but as a reminder. His ribs really fucking hurt.

“I’ll shoot you in the head if I have to, but the boss won’t be happy with me, so stay down,” he repeats his instruction one last time, before quickly making for the bedroom.

There, he opens three drawers, until he finds Clare’s belts, grabbing two. He leaves all the drawers open so he’ll know which to clean up when he leaves. Then he hurries back into the hallway.

Alfonso has crawled further into the hallways since Patrick left him, towards the living room, but he hasn’t gotten further than maybe a meter. Patrick doesn’t bother kicking him again, because he’s not cruel, and just stops next to him, pointing his gun at him casually.

“Hey man, I wouldn’t go in that direction if I were you. That’s where your girl is.”

He watches the dawning realisation bloom on Alfonso’s face, followed by a flash of pain, and okay, that does make Patrick feel a little bad. He gets that it has to be hard for Alfonso if he really loved her. He should have just been smarter about this and cut off contact with her, instead of this, because in the end, that’s the only way to save the people you love, in Patrick’s personal opinion. He sighs.

“Look, it was a lot less messy with her, okay? She didn’t fight back, so she died quick.”

Depending on your definition of quick. Being strangled to death isn’t the most pleasant, Patrick is pretty sure, but he’s trying to spare Alfonso, so he doesn’t go into more detail. Alfonso doesn’t ask either. Alfonso doesn’t say anything.

“Okay, let me just-“

Patrick sticks one gun in the back of his pants, like Alfonso had, and slides the other back inside his suit jacket so Alfonso can’t grab them in one go, but Patrick can still reach them if he needs to. Then he crouches next to Alfonso, belts in hand, and makes quick work of tying a makeshift tourniquet around Alfonso’s thigh on one hand, and his forearm on the other. He’s dubious about the effectiveness of the second tourniquet, but it will have to do.

“Now, don’t die until Cirone is done with you, okay?” Patrick asks Alfonso amicably.

Alfonso spits on the floor next to him. Patrick just raises an eyebrow and wipes his bloody hands on his own thigh. Then he pulls out his phone and dials Jason’s number, putting the phone on speaker.

“Hey boss,” he says brightly as soon as Jason picks up. “Got our friend Alfonso on speaker here, all packaged and ready to go.”

He snorts a little at his own joke. With the belts around his arm and leg, it really is like Alfonso is packaged, and, well. People do call dying “going” sometimes, don’t they?

There’s a beat of silence, followed by some clinking in the background, like Jason is putting a glass of sorts down, reminding Patrick of the late hour.

“Is that so?” Jason’s voice finally exits the phone. There’s another pause, in which both Patrick and Alfonso wait, completely still. “And tell me Patrick, where do you plan to take things from here? You’ve been such a valuable asset over the past five years, loyal, creative, I’m sure you’ve got something planned for our not quite so loyal friend, don’t you?”

Patrick can’t help it, he snorts. As much as he enjoys genuine praise from Jason, this isn’t it. But he supposes that Jason had indeed announced his intention to taunt Alfonso.

Alfonso, who is staring at Patrick’s phone like it’s a bomb, ready to go off on him any second. Given that Patrick hasn’t actually explained anything to him yet, his anxiety levels about what Jason might want from him have got to be through the roof.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, boss,” he tries, voice close to a hiss. “I’ve been nothing but loyal to you. My relations to Clare Roberts date back years, and I’ve done nothing – _nothing_ – to compromise you or our operations.”

Patrick raises an eyebrow at him.

“Eleven years and you haven’t learned yet to only speak when you are spoken to,” Jason says coolly. “Interesting. But since you seem so eager to participate why don’t _you_ prove some creativity? Make this worth my while. How would you proceed, my dear, loyal Alfonso?”

Patrick gives Alfonso an irritated look, because _hey_ , this was his moment. He has a great plan, thank you very much, and Jason should be impressed by him. Alfonso is just going to fumble, and if he says something that Jason likes, then Jason might ask Patrick to change _his_ plans, which could prove difficult, given where they are. This needs to look like the woman could have been the one to kill him.

Alfonso looks white as a sheet, most likely from the blood loss, but he also has a sneer on his face that Patrick knows has to be destined for him. He smiles back, baring his teeth, just to see Alfonso’s expression darken even more. It seems to distract him, too, because it takes a few seconds for him to come up with anything to say to Jason. Patrick would have suggested three different options already by now, if he was in Alfonso’s place.

“Tic toc, tic toc,” he whispers, miming the balance of a pendulum with his index.

Alfonso tries to ignore him, huffing out a breath that makes the blood under his nose bubble.

“I did nothing wrong, so I shouldn’t be getting punished,” Alfonso says stiffly. “Have I ever failed you, those eleven years? He’s-“ Patrick shakes his head silently, because that’s not what Jason wants to hear, and Alfonso is fucking it up. Alfonso stumbles. “I- He already shot me. Twice. And killed Clare. There’s no risk left, boss. I promise that if you let me live I’ll be your best, most loyal soldier. You don’t want clowns working for you-“

“Hey,” Patrick protests, vaguely offended.

“-you want people who are reliable and can do a job without drawing attention.”

“Do you see attention anywhere?” Patrick asks, gesturing towards the empty space around them with his free hand. “Nobody’s gonna find your bodies for days. And it’ll look like the perfect murder-suicide. I do _great_ work.”

Alfonso opens his mouth like he’s planning on answering, but gets interrupted before he can say anything.

“What did you think was going to happen, Alfonso?” Jason asks, tone threateningly gentle. “Did you not think it was going to end this tragically? You must have, you aren’t stupid or I wouldn’t have kept you for eleven years. But love makes you stupid, doesn’t it? You betrayed your family for her after all. The people who _made_ you.”

Patrick feels grimly satisfied when Jason confirms his thoughts. There’s no happy ending to loving people in this mob. Jason and Patrick have both given up on love, in their own ways, and it’s Alfonso, who went back to this woman, who’s now reaping the consequences of his actions. It hurts, but in the end, Alfonso should have known better.

“You say you did nothing wrong, but that’s not quite true, is it?” Jason continues. “Be honest with me and I might tell Patrick to make it quick and painless.”

Silently, Patrick presses his gun to Alfonso’s forehead. Alfonso closes his eyes, working his jaw like he wants to curse Patrick out again, or maybe jump at him. He’s in no condition to do so, though, and he knows it.

“Okay,” Alfonso admits. “Okay, I do love her.” He stops, a shuddering breath leaving his lips as he closes his eyes. “Did. She didn’t, but- I wanted to be closer to her, because we worked great together, and I wanted to use that to profit both of our organisations. We’re working _with_ the Rosatis, it’s not like they’re our enemies-“

“But you told her things?” Jason asks coldly. “You revealed our secrets to her?”

“No, it’s- Nothing big. Never anything dangerous for our family. Just what sort of missions I was doing, no details. I swear it, boss. I’m loyal to you.”

Patrick watches Alfonso’s face closely, and he’s not entirely sure if he believes him. If it’s the entire truth, then Alfonso should have played it down more if he wanted to beg for his life, but if it was more than that, then maybe Alfonso thinks this is small enough of an admission to save him. Patrick isn’t so sure that it is. Just knowing what operations Jason’s soldiers are working on could be valuable information for a rivalling mob.

“And yet you didn’t tell me about any of this,” Jason points out. “That doesn’t sound very loyal to me. Does it sound loyal to you, Patrick? What do you think?”

Patrick shrugs, glancing down at Alfonso. Alfonso has this sour look on his face like maybe he wants it to be pleading, but he also doesn’t want to plead with _Patrick_. He’s lucky that Patrick doesn’t genuinely get offended by shit like this.

Not that he cares about saving Alfonso’s life either.

“Well, he did call me a clown,” he says lightly, just to mess with Alfonso, who immediately pulls a face. Patrick winks at him, before focusing back on the phone, gun still directed at Alfonso’s head. “Actually, I just think that Alfonso was stupid, boss. And he’s right, he’s learned his lesson now, hasn’t he?” He cocks his head to the side a little. “I mean, I’m not sure I would want people who take stupid risks like these under me either, but doesn’t he at least deserve a clean death? I’m not vindictive, I wouldn’t mind.”

“A clean death,” Jason repeats thoughtfully. “That’s very generous of Patrick, don’t you agree, Alfonso? Is that what you want? What you think you deserve?  Or… do you think now that that pesky little distraction that got you acting all stupid is no longer a problem, you could be trusted to not make the same mistake again? I was very fond of you once, it’d be a pity to lose you because you were thinking with your dick.”

“You can trust me sir,” Alfonso says immediately. Patrick notices that there’s a lot more air on his voice than earlier. He has to be exhausted by now. “There won’t be a problem anymore. I’ve learned my lesson, you’re right.” He pauses, looking pinched. “He’s right. Please, boss, I won’t disappoint you.”

“Plus, if he fucks up again, we can still kill him,” Patrick says.

This time he removes the gun from Alfonso’s forehead. He doesn’t think that Jason will change his mind, because Jason likes things to go exactly how he imagined them, but maybe he’s trying to give Alfonso hope so he can disappoint him right after. Patrick inspects his gun, waiting for Jason to give his verdict. He’s going to have to clean the gun of any fingerprints, because he’s leaving it here after they’re done with this. If he’s framing the woman for Alfonso’s murder, the weapon needs to still be there.

“But you won’t fuck up again, Alfonso, will you?” Jason says, sounding like he’s already bored with the conversation. “You’ll be a good soldier again. Someone I can trust, someone who is loyal, who knows his place. Someone who will take this lesson and learn from it, embrace it. Someone who doesn’t want to end like his pretty little dead girlfriend.”

A flicker of hurt passes over Alfonso’s face when Jason calls the woman his girlfriend – or maybe it’s about the pretty little dead part, who knows – but that’s over soon, because Patrick can even begin to voice his thoughts about Jason changing his mind, which range somewhere between _What the fuck_ and _Are you fucking kidding me_ , he’s busy grovelling at Jason’s feet.

“Thank you, sir, I won’t forget this chance, I won’t disappoint you,” he says, so quickly that some syllables slur together. “Thank you. I’ll prove that I deserve this.”

“Yes, okay, we got that,” Patrick interrupts him, a little snappish. He lets out a breath, forcing himself to smile brightly so he doesn’t do something like curse and antagonise someone who’s apparently going to continue being his colleague after all. “Great. Very generous of you boss. Am I allowed to ask the Rosatis for help to clean up this mess? Cause if Alfonso’s gonna keep working with us he needs urgent medical care, and I can’t give that to him.”

That, and all the other shit that Patrick is going to have to take care of. Shit, he’s going to have to get rid of _all_ of Alfonso’s blood now, and it’s everywhere. That wasn’t the plan. Patrick might actually have to burn this place down if he wants to get rid of all the evidence, and there goes all his preparations. He’s a little pissed, if he’s honest here. At Jason, mostly.

“I praised you for being creative,” Jason says, and Patrick can practically see the careless hand flap that must go with his words. “Be creative. Do what you have to do, but don’t disappoint me.”

The _Ask Alfonso how that goes_ , goes unspoken. Patrick grits his teeth. This is going to be a messy clean-up, and Jason knowns it.

Patrick has no choice, though, so he makes himself smile, says “Yes, boss,” and waits for Jason to hang up on him.

Then he turns towards Alfonso, putting on a sheepish face. Fuck, he’s going to need to get Alfonso to trust him again if they’re going to keep working together.

“Well,” he says. “In my defence, I didn’t know the boss would change his mind.”

Alfonso just snorts unhelpfully.

 

~~~

 

Patrick calls Jason again the next morning, mostly because by the time he’s done with patching Alfonso up, it’s 4 in the morning. It would probably have been later if he’d tried to get the bullet out of Alfonso’s leg, but Patrick doesn’t have the medical skills to do that and be sure that he’s not going to kill Alfonso, so he’s had to settle for disinfecting the wounds and bandaging everything up to the best of his abilities. Abby will have to deal with reopening up Alfonso’s leg if the bullet really needs to be taken out then.

It’s shitty, because Patrick has to pay for all the material he buys at the pharmacy with his own money, too, which is less money that he’s going to be able to give Erica for her wedding, but he doesn’t complain, and Alfonso doesn’t either. They’ve finished the beer case in Alfonso’s room between the two of them by the time it’s done.

On the way back to his own hotel, a block away from Alfonso’s, Patrick finds himself wondering if Jason would forgive him too, if he ever found out that Patrick had cheated on him with Jonny.

“I never planned on killing him,” Jason tells him on the phone the next morning, and it gives Patrick the furious urge to throw something.

“Then why,” he asks, articulating every syllable, “did you not tell me that in advance?”

“He had to be scared for his life,” Jason says calmly. “And he was. You did your job well, Patrick, I don’t see why this has to be a problem.”

“Oh, it’s not a problem,” Patrick says sarcastically. “If you don’t mind that Alfonso might never walk normally again, cause I busted his kneecap off. Oh, and, you know. You don’t trust me. I could-”

“You don’t talk back to me,” Jason interrupts him, icy cold.

Patrick shuts up, jaw working. He’s pissed off, but Jason doesn’t sound like he’s joking, here. Which just makes it all the more frustrating, because this is Jason reasserting that Patrick isn’t his equal. That they’re not in a real relationship. Patrick is a pawn for Jason to use however he wants, and who doesn’t need to know more than Jason deems necessary for him to know.

“Alfonso will heal,” Jason continues. “As for whether I trust you- I’m confident in your abilities, Patrick. That should be enough for you.”

Patrick doesn’t answer, glaring at the empty bottle in his hand.

“Patrick.”

“Yes, sir,” he says stiffly. “Thank you.”

Jason informs him that killing the woman but not Alfonso won’t be a problem either, because he has made sure to warn Dean Rosati that he wouldn’t be killing Alfonso after all before Patrick took care of things. It’s the sort of information that Patrick files away at first, glad that this entire business won’t be making his negotiations with Rosati harder.

Later, though, when Patrick is sending Alfonso off at the airport, he thinks about what this means for him, personally. Jason never intended to kill either the woman, or Alfonso. The image of the woman slowly dangling from the noose she made shines before Patrick’s eyes, and this time, her face isn’t substituted for Jonny’s. It’s Clare Roberts who died, on Dean Rosati’s orders. No one else.

Patrick’s chest aches with how empty it feels, and for a second, he wonders what price he would be ready to pay to have that void filled again.

 

~~~

 

Three days later, he drives to Buffalo.

It might be the most stupid thing he could do right after what happened with Alfonso, or it might not matter at all.

Patrick feels high on the success of his talks with Dean Rosati. The contract that he designed with him means not only more money for them than for any of their other gun shipments in the past ten years, but it also cements a partnership that will go for longer than what Jason had first suggested. They have secured a client and partner for the next seven years, and this is _New York_. It’s a big deal. So much so that Patrick was asked to report to DiFronzo directly on the phone, and that he will talk to him again as soon as he’s back in Chicago.

It means that Patrick’s plans to rise in the ranks of the mob might not be so far off in the future after all. He has the boss’ eyes on him right now.

It means that Patrick needs to be even more careful about who he lets close to his heart.

Patrick isn’t going to get another chance like the one he has now, plain and simple. When he goes back to Chicago, he will devote himself body and soul to his work until Jason has no choice but to treat him like his equal, and then Patrick will get rid of him.

He spends a lot of time during the drive imagining the different ways that he could kill Jason. It’s a fantasy that makes Patrick smile to himself until he’s buzzing with anticipation. It probably won’t happen, and if it does, it won’t be soon, but there’s no harm done in day-dreaming.

He thinks about Erica more, though. Visiting her one last time won’t cost Erica her life. Hopefully, it won’t have any consequences at all. Not when Patrick just did so good that people will be too focussed on his work to care. And why would they? It’s a six hour drive from New York city, sure, but as long as Patrick does it within a day, no one will notice his absence. He doesn’t have anyone tailing him in New York, there are no cameras in his hotel room that Jason can use to control whether he’s there. He will be completely incognito.

It’s something that Patrick wants so much that he finally feels full with it, to the point of nausea. He’s going to Buffalo, just to see Erica’s face one more time, just to make sure that her future husband – Caleb – will treat her right. If it doesn’t look like it, then Patrick will take care of him. Heartbreak is always preferable to real hurt, and Patrick won’t allow his little sister to be hurt.

He doesn’t talk to Erica once he’s there. He doesn’t let her see him at all, because her safety still relies on her thinking that Patrick doesn’t care about her, that he will never get in contact with her ever again. It’s still very much Patrick’s intention after this to keep away from his family, because he loves them, and they don’t need to be mixed up in Patrick’s world. But he wants to see her face, even if she doesn’t see him back. He wants to see her wedding dress, so he can imagine what she will look like tomorrow, on the wedding day itself. So he can imagine he was there after all.

Patrick spends way too long watching the outside of the apartment she lives in with Caleb, waiting for her or Caleb to leave. He’s parked the car he rented in New York in front of their place before sunrise, and he’s hoping to catch Caleb alone. It’s probably not great that anyone can find his sister’s address online when googling white pages, but in this specific case, it helped. Even if it makes him feel like a stalker.

He has two bundles of hundred-dollar bills in his pocket that he plans to give her somehow, for the wedding. Hopefully not to pay for her fiancée’s funeral if Patrick decides to kill him, but if that’s the case, he hopes she will take the money anyway.

Not wanting to miss anyone going in or out of the apartment, Patrick doesn’t go to get breakfast for himself. Instead he finds his mind drifting to Jonny again, and whether he should try to pay back Jonny’s student loans too, as a sort of apology for ghosting him (again). Knowing Jonny, though, he gets the feeling that it wouldn’t be appreciated, and he doesn’t want to offend him. Unlike with his sisters, he has no _responsibility_ towards Jonny that’s bigger than their feelings.

It’s nearing ten in the morning when something finally happens.

Patrick is busy yawning and wishing he had some alcohol lying around in the car, and maybe someone nice to text to pass the time – because texting with Jonny all day had been nice, and Patrick kind of misses it a lot, which is stupid – when he sees three women get out of a car not far from him and walk towards the building. He follows them with lazy eyes, but it’s only when they pass right in front of his car and he can hear their conversation drift through his window that he recognises them.

It’s his sisters. His two little sisters, Jess and Jackie, together with someone he doesn’t know and frankly, doesn’t give a damn about because right now, he’s too busy staring at how grown up they both look. When he left Buffalo, he’d been seventeen, and Jess had been fourteen. Jackie had barely been thirteen. He’s seen two whole pictures of them since, and he’s had to delete both of them from his phone in a matter of days. It’s nothing that could have prepared him for now.

Jessie looks confident, smiling as she chats with the third girl, in a flowy flannel and shorts, her hair a shocking pink. Jackie’s hair on the other hand is long and a much darker brown than he remembers, and she’s so different that it feels like a punch to the face. She’s nineteen, just finished her first year at university, and she’s taller than both Jessie and the other girl. She looks like a grown woman. It’s no wonder that it took him a few moments to recognise them, but that doesn’t really help. He still didn’t recognise his own sisters.

His throat is full of spikes when he swallows.

They disappear in Erica’s building soon, and Patrick doesn’t cry. He stares at the roof of his car and breathes harshly until the feelings have gone back enough that he can shove them back into their respective boxes.

When finally they come back outside, over an hour later, it’s with Erica in tow, and a bunch of bags over their shoulders. Patrick ducks his head so they won’t spot him as they walk by and forces himself to exhale. She might be the one that changed the least out of the three of them, but she’s still so much older. So much more like someone he doesn’t know. It’s awful.

Patrick waits another ten minutes after their car has driven away, and then goes up to the door of the apartment, ringing at the doorbell. He’s going to have a conversation with Caleb, and then maybe he’ll break into his parents’ home to see the dress, something like that. Depending on how this goes and whether he can gather up the courage to go back to his childhood home. Which, surprisingly, is not something that he wants to do, at all. Just the thought of seeing the house again – and his parents – makes him break out in cold sweat. So he’ll see.

“Hello?” a crackly voice says through the interphone, and Patrick makes himself smile, projecting himself into the character he’s playing now.

“Hey, it’s Harry,” he says.

There’s a moment of silence. “Harry?”

“Yeah, Harry. You know, Erica’s cousin?”

There’s another moment of silence, and then Caleb buzzes him up.

The best way to trick someone into believing you are who you say you are is to pretend like you’re expecting them to already know, Patrick has learned. When he greets Caleb with a grin and a clap to the shoulder, making his way past him into the apartment like he’s expecting to be welcomed there, Caleb just gives him a vaguely confused look but allows it. It’s a little bit funny, even, when Patrick insists that Erica _must_ have talked to Caleb about him, because Caleb gets incredibly flustered and proceed to stumble through a confirmation that’s clearly a lie just so he doesn’t look like a bad fiancée for forgetting part of Erica’s family.

Given how many cousins they have, Patrick can’t fault him for being unsure. He explains to Caleb with an amused smile that he’s Rose, Lisa and August’s brother, and watches how Caleb’s shoulders relax incrementally when he manages to place those names. After all, this is Patrick’s family too. It’s not like he’s going to fail on a quiz about his family members. Unless, of course, Caleb asks him about anything that has happened within the last six years, but really, other than that, Patrick is good. He’s even got family resemblance speaking for him.

“Erica is out with the girls doing some last-minute preparations, you just missed her,” Caleb says apologetically, before offering Patrick coffee.

Patrick is happy to accept it, after not drinking anything since the water bottle in his car ran out. He sips it as he observes his surroundings, taking in the apartment as he mumbles something about it being okay, he’ll talk to Erica later, if he comes across her.

“I can’t make it tomorrow, last minute business meeting, unfortunately, so I really wanted to congratulate you guys in advance,” he says brightly.

It’s strange, being in Erica’s space. It could be anyone’s apartment, except for the tiny details that he recognises. They are far more few and in-between than he’d expected them to be, if he’s being honest, but they’re still there. The bookshelf in the living room has a couple of books that he swears he recognises as some of Erica’s favourites when she was a kid, even if they didn’t own all of them back then. One of the chairs looks like it might have been taken from their childhood home. Everything is neatly placed, despite how small and crammed the room is, reminding Patrick of sharing a room with Erica himself, and how they would fight about where to put things because neither of them liked when anything was lying around on the ground.

And then there’s the pictures. Tons of them, in the hallway, in the living room, hanging from practically every wall. Most of them have Erica in them, some have Caleb, looking younger than he does now. Caleb seems to have worn a beard for a couple years, because it’s in a lot of pictures, but seems to have been shaved off for the wedding. There are pictures of the girls together – Erica and Jessie and Jackie, sometimes with Mom or Dad. Patrick only spots one of them where the five of them are together in one frame, and it seems to be Erica’s graduation picture. She’s beaming at the camera, holding her high school diploma proudly, Mom’s arm around her waist, and Patrick can’t breathe for one moment.

There’s a picture with Patrick on it too. It’s just Erica and him in it, as kids, before Patrick left the house for the first time. He’s got to be ten in the picture, maybe, and he’s pushing a laughing Erica on a swing, slightly out of focus. He doesn’t remember the moment at all. Swallowing dryly, he looks back down at his mug, and thinks that it’s lucky that this is the only picture of him Erica has, because it means that Caleb is less likely to recognise him.

There are over twenty pictures just in the living room, mostly of family, and he’s in only one of them, as a child, but it’s a good thing. Because he left this family. Of course he wouldn’t be in any pictures. Patrick himself doesn’t even own pictures of the girls, much less of himself at that age.

“Everything okay?” Caleb asks, and Patrick pulls himself together enough to smile at him.

“Yes, it’s just so strange, you know? Little Erica getting married. I still remember when she was seven and she liked to terrorise me with her makeup pallet.”

Caleb laughs. “She’s always been a fearsome woman.”

Patrick smiles and sips from his coffee.

He stays for maybe half an hour in total before excusing himself. Caleb doesn’t strike him as the smartest guy around, and he might be a little too trusting, but Patrick gives him the benefit of the doubt because it’s his wedding day tomorrow, and he’s going to be overwhelmed by the Kane family soon enough. More importantly, Caleb talks about Erica like she’s awesome and he can’t wait to see her again, even today, even though they live together and they’re going to be busy. He mentions that they’re going to sleep apart tonight and that he’s going to miss her, laughing like it’s a joke, but also not, and Patrick just- he can’t hate him. Part of him really, really wants to, but how can he fault the man who’s about to marry his sister for loving her? Erica _is_ awesome.

Before he leaves, he pulls the money out of his pocket and presses it into Caleb’s hand, whose eyes immediately go as wide as saucers.

“It’s for the wedding,” he says, and Caleb immediately stammers something about not being able to accept it, and it being way too much. Patrick just smiles and shoves his hands into his pockets. “Come on dude. I just want to do this for my little cousin, and she’s too proud to accept money from me, so just take it. You don’t even have to tell her about it, okay? Just use it for the wedding, and make sure you spoil her during your honeymoon.”

“But Harry, this is a lot of money,” Caleb protests weakly.

Patrick shrugs, shifting his weight back on the ball of his feet. “You only get married once, right?” He pauses, and winks. “Ideally.”

“I- Thank you,” Caleb finally says, and Patrick beams at him.

“Oh, and- Just one last thing?” Patrick smiles. “You better do right by her, or I’m going to murder you in your sleep.”

Caleb laughs awkwardly. “Aye aye.”

It’s a lie, because if this fucker really hurts Erica, then Patrick won’t be as merciful as killing him in his sleep, but if he gets too graphic now, then Caleb might realise how real the threat is, and Patrick doesn’t want him suspecting that Patrick might be a criminal, on the off-chance that he tells Erica about him.

Or, well. He _is_ going to tell Erica about Patrick. He might not have if there hadn’t been the money, what with all the stress of the wedding and them not seeing each other again until tomorrow, but it’s not like Patrick could have not given money to his sister for her wedding, so he supposes that he’s going to have to deal with Erica knowing he came to Buffalo and didn’t talk to her. Caleb might not know enough about him to suspect that the random guy who looks like family squeezing money into his hand is Patrick, but she will know. And she’s going to hate him for it.

“Don’t let her throw out the money,” he calls over his shoulder before taking the stairs down to leave.

Erica is just going to have to deal.

 

~~~

 

Patrick doesn’t go to his parents’ house.

He takes his car into town and drives around until he finds the café Erica, the girls, and her friends are having lunch at instead and watches them like a creep from his car until they leave. He has his own sandwich and a couple beers, because as much as he wants to be drunk right now, he still needs to drive another six hours back to New York. He already hasn’t slept, that’s enough of a road hazard as it is. So Patrick rests his chin on the driving wheel and munches on his sandwich, watching the girls through hooded eyes.

They look happy, he thinks. Erica seems a little bit stressed, but that’s not too worrying given the context, and Jessie keeps laughing pretty much every time one of the girls says something. Patrick has no idea what they could be talking about, because he doesn’t really know any of them – not even his own sisters, not anymore – but it’s still therapeutic, somehow, just to watch them exist. They’re alive, they’re doing normal girl things. They’re far away from him in more ways than just through his windshield cutting off the sounds from him, and that’s good. Without question, good.

When they’ve finished eating, they get up and Patrick notices that there’s a grey suit bag over Erica’s arm now that wasn’t there earlier this morning. He wonders if it’s her dress. He wishes he could see it. But the girls gather up all their things and then walk off towards where their car is probably parked.

Patrick _wants_.

He starts up the car and backs out.

 

~~~

 

The drive back to New York is a special kind of torture. With every mile that Patrick puts between himself and his sisters, it feels like the hole in his chest is growing, their faces flashing before his eyes, together with the certainty that he won’t see them again. Because he can do this once without getting caught, but can he twice? Can he three times? Patrick can’t risk finding out.

The last time Patrick left Buffalo, he had been seventeen, and he hadn’t known that he would never see his family again.

Patrick swallows down the ache and keeps driving and doesn’t cry.

And doesn’t cry.

And doesn’t cry.

He thinks about Jonny, who he’d told that he might not make his sister’s wedding, but that he would try to go. He thinks about how Jonny doesn’t even get along with his brother all that well, because his brother is in the army, and Jonny is a pacifist. Yet another reason why Jonny would hate Patrick if he ever found out the truth about him, but also laughable, because god, Jonny can see his family whenever he wants, and he doesn’t. He doesn’t care. Patrick is both jealous and incredibly bitter, and fuck, he wishes he could see Jonny himself too.

It might be stupid, but Jonny is just- Jonny is easy. Everything with Jonny was easy, in the time that they spent together – way too much time for how short of a friendship it was, in the end. Nothing is ever easy or good in Patrick’s life, because he kills people for a living. He set a building on fire four days ago to cover up his murder. He’s celebrating an arms deal with the New York mob that will only result in more killings, all while his boss treats him like he’s just as unimportant as the people he kills, and the only difference is that he likes to put his dick in Patrick.

And Patrick _likes_ his job. He’s good at it, even if he knows that he causes harm. Jonny would hate him for it, Erica would hate him for it, but Patrick doesn’t care, because he’s doing something with his life, he finally has a future, and he can drive to Buffalo and press 5K into his brother in law’s hand if he wants to because he makes enough money to do that. There’s so much evil in the world, what does it matter that Patrick hurts other people? He doesn’t know them. He doesn’t care about them. The people he works with with Showtime – the _real_ volunteers and good-doers – are just hypocrites if they think that anything they’re doing will truly help anyone but themselves and how they feel about themselves.

Patrick feels good about himself when he succeeds, and that’s all there is to it.

He blasts the music as loud as the car radio will go without making him deaf and nods his head to the rhythm of the music as he drives.

 

~~~

 

He meets with DiFronzo when he gets back to Chicago.

He meets with Jason too, and lets Jason do his thing, pretending like he missed him despite the way the sight of him makes Patrick want to throw punches. Being drunk for most of it helps.

What matters, though, is that he gets praised for the work he did in New York, and that he can use the opportunity to plug his ideas for Showtime to their big boss once again. DiFronzo gets this thoughtful look on his face and asks Patrick whether he would be interested in working in their money laundering branch full time, or if he likes working multiple branches like this. Patrick grins and tells him that he likes being proficient in as many things at once as he can.

Sharpy takes him out for drinks afterwards, and Patrick gets to chat with Abby about how her life is going and how Alfonso is healing from his wounds. It’s a good evening.

When he goes back to Trump tower, though, Patrick accidentally knocks down one of the empty bottles on his beside table, and when he looks at it – at the dozen of empty bottles littering the side of his bed, he thinks _Oh_.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter warnings:**  
>  \- Death: seriously, murder warning. Pat murders someone, and he doesn't feel bad about it. This person dies by hanging and their death is explicitly described.  
> \- Violence: including shooting, punching, and emotional violence  
> \- Bad medical practice - Patrick does first aid on someone, which he is not qualified for  
> \- Stalking/spying on your close relative  
> \- Unsafe driving: don't drink and drive kids, not even beer, and don't drive while completely exhausted either with no other person in the car with you  
> \- Mention of alcoholism


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: this is a chapter that deals heavily with alcoholism. Please check the end notes if that topic might be triggering for you (although I suppose that if you've made it this far into the story, you have to be at least somewhat comfortable with the topic).
> 
> This is a very long chapter. ;)
> 
> Special thanks to [Mel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheNorthRemembers/pseuds/TheNorthRemembers), who is the source for all the medical blabla you'll find in this and every other chapter of this fic. If you like medical H/C like we have at the end of this chapter, I highly recommend checking out Mel's [Streets of Chicago](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16906140/chapters/39717042), because it's basically that x1000. Also, it's amazing.

****Finishing all the alcohol you have lying around the house might not be the most rational reaction to realising that you have an alcohol problem. But then, Patrick has never pretended that he was the most rational person in dealing with the things that make him weak.

It’s been three days since he got back from New York, and the table in front of him looks like he’s trying to pile up bottles like a tower of cards. There’s beer, mostly, because Patrick has been telling himself that drinking beer doesn’t mean anything. Patrick drinks beer and drives. Everyone drinks beer all the time around him. The only thing that might be different, he realises now, is that his colleagues probably don’t average three beers at night – two to go to sleep, one when he inevitably wakes up again. And it’s not just beer. Patrick found an empty wine bottle, from a night he’d made himself finish the wine Sharpy had given him, even though he doesn’t even like wine. There’s a bottle of Malibu that was two thirds full when Patrick looked around. Even a bottle of absinthe, of all things.

Of course, there’s whisky too. He’s gotten through the first bottle last night, so it’s thankfully empty now. The second one, though, is still one third full. As he sips on his fourth whisky glass of the evening – at least Patrick has built up a resistance, so hopefully, he won’t give himself alcohol poisoning by drinking it straight – Patrick goes through the texts he got from Erica since leaving Buffalo one more time, just because he can.

_[From: Magnolia]_

_Caleb told me ev, did you really think that pretending you were a cousin THAT WE DON’T HAVE was going to fool me? Or did you fuckng forget that we don’t have a Harry in the family???_

He likes the way it hurts. It feels like poking at a bruise, scratching an itch Patrick didn’t even realise he had. It’s a tangible proof of why he’s doing any of this. Of the fact that he loves her too much to risk her life. It’s proof that she still loves him too.

Rereading messages is in no way something he’d even consider doing when sober, because he doesn’t like thinking about Erica when he’s sober, but right now? Patrick relishes in it.

_[From: Magnolia]_

_How could you do this to me Patty?_

_You didn’t talk to me_

_You didn’t come to my wedding_

_I DON’T WANT YOUR MONEY_

Patrick hopes that Caleb made her keep the money anyway. He doesn’t care if she wants it or not. She deserves all of the good things. She deserves the world, always. And maybe Patrick can’t give her anything else, but he can give her that. After all, money is the key to being happy, isn’t it?

_[From: Magnolia]_

_I’m done_

_Are you fucking reading this?????????????_

_I’m done with you_

_Don’t send me money again_

_I don’t want to hear from you unless you’re ready to man the fuck up and be my brother again_

Patrick giggles shakily into his glass, because shit, it really took six years for Erica to understand that she wasn’t going to get him back, and what did it take? Him going to Buffalo in person and not seeing her. It’s so fucking stupid that it’s funny, topping off years and years of Erica trying for nothing. He feels bad for her, he really does.

Patrick downs the whisky glass before wiping at his cheeks where they’re wet with tears. Better laugh than cry, better not feel anything than either of those, but Patrick is doing both.

 _I miss you_ , he thinks.

He wants to write to her, but he knows he can’t. It doesn’t matter how drunk he is, he won’t make that mistake.

Right now, he thinks that he’s peaked in all the ways in which he could disappoint his sister. It’s not just his job, which is the one thing that he’s not ashamed of, or the way he’s been ignoring her messages, her wedding, any bone that she’s thrown his way in the past six years. No, the worst thing about him right now, is that he’s a fucking drunk.

Just like their mother.

Patrick is self-aware enough to know that he’s at risk with any addictive substances, given his history with drugs. Maybe he had only ever truly been addicted to crack – although a case can be made for weed – but that doesn’t mean that he can’t be weak to anything else. It clearly doesn’t, not when Patrick looks at the bottles in front of him and dreads not tomorrow, when he will inevitably have to use his coffee breaks at work to go puke in the bathroom. Not when it’s going to be even worse once he has nothing left to drink.

He remembers trying to support Mom’s weight up the stairs when he was six years old, because she couldn’t walk straight anymore from the bottles. He remembers all the times that she yelled at him, or the girls, because she had had one too much, and the smell of cheap wine, always pungent in the kitchen. He remembers catching Dad emptying Mom’s bottles in the sink and Mom putting the blame on Patrick for it. Making him pay it back with the money he’d earned from selling drugs to the other kids at his school.

Patrick grabs the whisky bottle and turns it upside down above his glass, watching the way the liquid flows down in lazy bursts, slowing down every time the air comes back up to fill the space left by the alcohol in the bottle. _Glug glug glug_. Like the wine in the sink, amber gold where he remembers it being red.

The whisky spills past the edge of his glass, spilling over, onto the table. Patrick can’t stand the smell of it. He turns the bottle back upright, interrupting the flow. Still, the liquid drips from the wood table, splashing onto the ground. Onto his thighs, permeating through the fabric of his slacks. His throat is burning, and the vapours make his head feel woozy.

Suddenly tired, Patrick gets up. The chair behind makes a clattering noise as it falls back. It reminds him of Clare Robert dying, except that he was the one standing then and he’s still standing now. Drunk off his ass and feeling like he might not have till tomorrow after all to throw up. He stumbles to the bathroom to take care of that rather than try to lie down and have to get up again. It helps with how sick he feels, but doesn’t stop the way the world is spinning around him.

Afterwards, he lets himself drop on his bed fully clothed and pulls the comforter over himself, before falling into a fitful sleep.

 

~~~

 

He manages to finish the alcohol that’s hidden everywhere around the apartment after five days of binge drinking. He might have gotten through it quicker if he hadn’t had to work, but he’d needed to still be functional enough to get back into planning his gala, because whatever personal crisis Patrick is going through right now, he can’t mess this up. He just downs pain killers every morning, drinks a lot of alcohol, and tells his co-workers and Jason that he’s sick to explain away the pale and sweaty face thing he has going on.

Jason still comes over twice in that time, so Patrick stashes away the bottles and does his best to clean up, just enough that Jason won’t guess. Because he can’t. Jason was already the one who got Patrick out of his last relapse. He’d noticed that something was going on before anyone else, and when Patrick’s lung had given in on him, he had reacted quickly enough to get him to the hospital in time, making sure that Patrick had all the care that he needed, and paying for all expenses. He had taken care of Patrick, and Patrick had _hated_ it. He doesn’t want to be indebted to Jason like that ever again.

It’s not that Patrick’s crack lung episode in 2009 was another proof that Jason loved him, exactly. It’s shown one aspect of Jason’s love for Patrick, which is his refusal to let Patrick _break_ , but it’s far from meaning that Jason cares about each and every of Patrick’s injuries. Patrick’s cracked rib from the incident with Alfonso is only just starting not to hurt anymore, and he doesn’t think that Jason has asked about it once. Worse, the judgement Patrick would get from Jason for being weak to something as simple – as common – as alcohol makes Patrick shudder, just thinking about it.

So Patrick tries to do it alone.

He doesn’t drink. Or rather, he tries not to. After everything is gone, he doesn’t buy anything, doesn’t drink anything other than water. He goes to the gym twice a day – once before work, once after, to make sure he’s sweating every residue out of his blood. He tries to get back on the meal plan he made himself after 2009 in an effort to get his body back to its best possible state.

The first time, he manages to last exactly 32 hours without alcohol before giving in.

His hands are shaking when he swipes his card over the supermarket counter for his pack of beer. Just beer, so it’s not as much of a failure. His mouth tastes like bile anyway for the two days that the case lasts him. It’s only barely an improvement to the taste of vomit.

The second time, he lasts 15.

The third time, it’s exactly two hours.

The fourth, he manages two days again, but by the end of it, he’s shaking so hard that he doesn’t think he’ll be able to make it to work, and that’s what sets him off. He buys another two cases, and drinks himself to exhaustion, feeling like he has completely lost his footing.

There was a time where he stopped smoking crack alone, out of pure grit and willing his cravings into submission. He had worked during that time, even, through smiles bloody from biting his tongue so much and an emptiness in his gut that made the lights flicker at the corners of Patrick’s eyes. He thinks there was one time that he went blind for a full hour, and he still managed to push through it without anyone else’s help. The fact that he can’t do it now, when he has so much more to lose, when he was supposed to have gotten a grip back on his life, feels like the worst part of it all.

In the end, it’s surprisingly easy to decide on going to see Jonny.

From the second he thinks about it, Patrick knows that it’s what he needs to do. Jonny is easy. Jonny has always been easy. He can make Patrick better, because just by being in Jonny’s presence, Patrick’s head goes quiet. And Patrick needs his head to be quiet right now, more than ever, so he can make it through withdrawal on his own. He wouldn’t even have to tell Jonny about it, as long as Jonny agrees to smile at Patrick again and make him laugh with his dorky straight-forwardness and stories about his college hockey team. Maybe Jonny would even let Patrick fuck him again, just to take the edge off. Something good to make the bad a little less worse.

Then Patrick remembers that Jonny is a doctor, and that he might know how Patrick needs to do this if he wants to still be able to work while he’s on withdrawal. And really, that’s even better, because unlike Abby, Jonny won’t judge him for it. He won’t try to mother Patrick or ask him if he’s at risk because he took one too many pain killers for her taste.

Well, Jonny isn’t quite a doctor _yet_ , but it’s only a year until he is, so it’s practically the same, in Patrick’s opinion.

Plus, Jonny is a slut for helping people. As if there needed to be another reason why Patrick going to see Jonny is a good idea. Patrick grins tiredly into the beer he’s nursing and thinks _Jackpot_. Jonny won’t be able to resist if he thinks that Patrick genuinely needs him, and if he needs an explanation about Patrick ghosting him, then Patrick will just serve him the backstory that he had made up back in April. He hasn’t had a chance to test it on Jonny yet. Maybe it will even get Jonny to only pity him for the fake stuff without Patrick needing to feel worse than he already does about the drinking.

And when Patrick is really, finally better, he will cut ties with Jonny again, so that no harm comes to either of them. It will be a win-win situation.

 

~~~

 

Patrick goes to Jonny’s house on a Thursday evening. He thinks that it might be the second week of the new semester for Jonny, or maybe the third. Either way, though, Jonny is going to be back from Canada, which is all that matters. When he gets there, Patrick peeks up the side of the building before going up the stairs, just to check that there is light.

It’s been about two months since they last saw each other.

The things is, Patrick could have called ahead. That would have been the polite thing to do. It might even have helped Patrick to win Jonny over, despite the very real risk that Jonny could have told him to fuck off. But Patrick doesn’t have Jonny’s phone number anymore, has deleted it off his phone back in July. The note that Jonny had first scribbled his number on when they’d bumped into each other at the hospital for the first time is long gone too.

So Patrick finds himself stranded in front of Jonny’s apartment door, trying to remind himself that this is all just part of a play, and that just because Patrick needs Jonny’s help doesn’t mean that he’s truly asking for help as _himself_. He’s going to be playing Pat, now. Pat, who’s a little douchy and repressed and who hurt Jonny’s feelings, but who still truly cares about people. It feels less vulnerable that way, thinking that he’s asking help for Pat. Patrick hopes to get to spill the entire backstory to Jonny – the one about Pat’s mom being homophobic and Pat dating a girl so he can still have his family – just to make the drinking less real. It’s like another piece of the puzzle that makes out Pat, and Pat doesn’t really exist.

Patrick, on the other hand, made sure to drink enough for the past three days to have some semblance of control over his body. He needs to be smooth about this, introduce things slowly. Showing up at Jonny’s doorstep with bloodshot eyes and clammy hands he can’t stop from shaking just doesn’t cut the bill that way.

After longer than what would seem natural to anyone watching him, Patrick finally manages to make himself ring at Jonny’s doorbell. For the few seconds it takes until he hears footsteps, he prays that TJ won’t be the one to open the door to him. Then he smiles. Then he remembers not to, because Pat is sad, and Patrick needs to cut down on the fake cheerfulness for this brand of fake.

He swallows thickly, and waits for the door to open.

“Oh,” Jonny simply says, when he opens the door. He doesn’t look overjoyed at the sight of Patrick in front of his door, but he doesn’t look outright hostile either, which Patrick counts as a win. He’s wary and tired-looking himself, if anything. “Hi?”

Jonny lost weight since Patrick last saw him, and there are shadows hollowing his cheeks where they weren’t before. The shadows in his face are deeper than before, his eyes appearing all the bigger and darker from the contrast of it. It distracts Patrick from his roleplaying for a second, taken by surprise by the changes. Jonny looks- maybe not sick, but like he’s recovering from an illness. Patrick nearly asks if he’s okay.

Then he remembers that Jonny might hate him right now, and that it’s really not his place to ask. He swallows, letting some nervousness transpire onto his face.

“Hi,” he says back timidly, making a small wave before crossing his hands behind his back, shifting back onto the balls of his feet as he glances up at Jonny and tries to judge how to best go about this.

Jonny might be someone who is generally easy to read, but Patrick still isn’t a magician who knows exactly how to manipulate someone from so little an exchange. He needs to feel things out so he can fill in the gaps between the last time he saw Jonny and how Jonny is feeling now. Letting his gaze wander purposefully, he waits for the silence between them to thicken. Just to establish that Pat isn’t comfortable about this situation either.

Finally, he clears his throat. “So I wanted to come apologise.”

Jonny blinks.

“Okay.” He steps aside, freeing the doorway for Patrick. “We can go to my room? TJ and Lauren are shooting soft porn in the living-room.”

Patrick blinks back.

Out of all the things he had expected Jonny to answer, this isn’t it. There’s no protest, no anger visible on Jonny’s face – just gentle surprise and a hint of wariness. Jonny is inviting him with a chance to explain himself. For a second, Patrick thinks that it’s too easy. There’s got to be some sort of trap, somewhere.

But then he looks at Jonny’s face again and he remembers. _Oh right_. This is why he is here. Because Jonny makes things easy for him.

“Thank you,” he says quietly, stepping into the hallway and waiting for Jonny to close the door behind him before looking at the portion of living room you can see from here.

He can hear wet sounds from here already, and for a split-second, he finds himself curious about meeting Lauren, who he’s heard so much about from both Jonny and TJ. That curiosity is soon replaced by the realisation that they’re going to have to walk past that couch to get to Jonny’s room, though, and he nearly lets out a groan. TJ _might_ just have something to say about Patrick suddenly showing up in his apartment after ghosting his best buddy for two months.

Jonny motions for Patrick to follow him, so Patrick does, ducking his head and allowing some tension to bleed through in the way he’s holding himself.

Unlike with Erica’s place, coming back into this living room is nothing like being in a stranger’s space. In fact, nothing seems to have changed since the last time Patrick was here – there’s still potted plants all around, books poorly sorted on a few shelves next to a soccer ball here, and a bunch of canned foods that Patrick knows don’t fit on Jonny’s kitchen shelves. There’s also the dark blue couch that Patrick made out with Jonny on enough times to get flashbacks just from seeing TJ and Lauren do the same. It’s cosy and warm, and fuck, Patrick feels weirdly _relieved_ , just from being here.

“What’s _he_ doing here?” TJ asks, before Jonny and Patrick manage to make it halfway across the room.

He looks at Patrick with a seething glare that’s probably supposed to be threatening, but makes Patrick want to pat his shoulder instead. It would be easier than bristle under the attention that he really, really didn’t want.

Patrick doesn’t do that. He gives TJ one glance, Lauren a shy smile, and then looks back down at his feet, like he’s embarrassed that they’re seeing him like this.

He tries not to think too much about how he would feel about them seeing _him_ , not Pat, crawling back to Jonny because of an addiction. This isn’t it. This isn’t him.

“TJ,” Jonny cuts in warningly, at the same time as Patrick tries a shy-sounding,

“I just want to talk to Jonny.”

“What?” TJ snaps, bracing himself on his elbows, Lauren watching them curiously from underneath him. “What he just gets to treat you like shit, drop of the face of the earth when things get tough and when you’re better again he just shows up? Fuck that.”

Patrick throws Jonny a glance, suddenly made aware of Jonny’s paleness again. He really must have been ill during the summer, if TJ is saying stuff like this, and it makes Patrick wonder how bad it must have been. If maybe it was an accident, and not an illness at all.

“You know it had nothing to do with that,” Jonny says, voice cold.

There’s a beat of silence, in which Jonny and TJ stare at each other.

“Who’s the cutie?” Lauren interrupts them, tilting her head in Patrick’s direction.

Her blonde hair is tousled and there’s a blush on her cheeks that is outclassed by TJ’s by miles, but Patrick is immediately certain that she knows what she’s doing. That she’s used to breaking up TJ and Jonny’s fights.

TJ groans, covering her eyes with his hand for a moment.

“We don’t like him,” he says. “Sorry, baby.”

“Pity,” Lauren says, letting out a giggle and pushing TJ’s hand away to now glare at Patrick too. Her glaring is marginally better than TJ’s.

“Okay,” Jonny says, clapping his hands together. “Proceed with eating each other’s faces, please. I’m gonna go and have a conversation with the cutie you don’t like. Bye.”

Then he grabs Patrick’s hand and tugs him the rest of the way into his room, closing the door behind them. Jonny’s hand is warm in Patrick’s, making a shiver go down Patrick’s neck because if he’s counting things that make him weak, then Jonny touching him is definitely one of them. His body is traitorously disappointed when Jonny lets go again to close the door behind him.

Patrick lets out a silent breath, telling himself to chill the fuck out. He’s not here to get Jonny to touch him.

“Sorry about that,” Jonny says, leaning against his desk so he can turn towards Patrick with his arms crossed. “TJ is just- He’s TJ. He’s angry with you for hurting me.”

Patrick flinches.

“Well, he did make his intentions quite clear at the beginning,” he says, aiming for a light tone, but letting enough awkwardness seep through that he knows he will fail. Then, because the question is burning on his mind, he adds, “But uh, what did he mean? Were you sick during the summer?”

“Yeah,” Jonny says, shrugging. “I was in the hospital for six weeks. Which you'd know if you hadn't ghosted me.”

There’s a pause, in which Patrick avoids Jonny’s eyes, mind stuck on- _six weeks_. Jesus. That sounds awful. Patrick doesn’t know if it means that Jonny was truly ill, if he had an accident, or if he had his own kind of relapse, with his heart being weak since birth. He feels shaky with it, imagining Jonny alone in his hospital bed for this long. Patrick’s mouth opens to ask for an explanation, but Jonny barrels on, clearly not interested in sidetracking the conversation.

“Why did you do that, Pat?” Patrick swallows. “If you were sick of me of being friends and having sex, you should have just told me. I prefer outright rejection over- This.”

This time, the breath Patrick can’t help but huff is genuine, somewhere between surprise and disbelieving amusement. Jonny couldn’t be further away from the truth than thinking that Patrick was sick of him – both the real truth, and Pat’s.

“No,” Patrick says, shaking his head gently. He keeps his shoulders hunched, appropriately contrite. Clears his throat. Shifts from one foot to the other. “No, I wasn’t sick of you.”

He looks at Jonny, licking his lips. This is where he makes or breaks the lie, and it makes his pulse flutter enough to bring colour to his cheeks. Damn, he’d forgotten how strongly he reacted to Jonny, in the midst of his considerations about how easy this would be. It’s all a little too close under Patrick’s skin. He has to pull himself together to get the story on the road instead of pulling back. This is supposed to be Patrick’s show, after all.

“I like you a lot and I can’t be with you,” he says quietly. “It’s really not-“ He interrupts himself to scratch the back of his head. “Look. I need to be straight. That’s not a choice for me. I shouldn’t even be back here, I just- I didn’t know what to do. I’m sorry I ghosted you. I’m-“ he gives Jonny a bittersweet smile, “really bad at quitting things in a way that’s healthy.”

It’s a seed that Patrick is planting here, to make the reveal about his alcoholism more plausible later. He likes the way playing Pat allows him to pause in the middle of sentences, how he gets extra time to think every time he pretends to hesitate. It lets him calculate his words when the sight of Jonny in front of him, next to the bed that they fucked on so many times, is making his stomach turn.

“You ghosting me, was your attempt at quitting me,” Jonny repeats carefully. “Because you need to be straight.”

“Yeah,” Patrick, smiling self-depreciatingly. “Like I said. Sorry that you had to deal with that.”

Jonny’s face is still closed off, but less hostile now. It makes Patrick hope.

“Can I ask why you need to be straight?” Jonny asks, hesitant. “And why- Why you came back here? To me? You didn’t talk to me all summer, you could have just continued to do that. Chicago is big enough for the both of us.”

Patrick’s looks away as he tries to think of the best way to frame his answer, mind quickly leafing through possibilities. He can’t overwhelm Jonny with his tragic backstory, but he can't also just ask for help outright and expect Jonny to forgive and forget. Patrick’s grand plan requires Jonny to _want_ to help him.

There's also the part of Patrick that still isn't sure how much it wants to reveal to Jonny about the drinking at all. Patrick's history with addiction is relevant, there, but how much of a change does it really make if Jonny doesn't know? Then he would just be helping Pat in the present, and maybe that would be safer. It would keep him further away from Patrick, and Patrick needs that distance if he wants to keep his pride while also asking for Jonny’s support.

“So,” Patrick says, clicking his tongue before putting on a poorly done determined face – which is what comes across as trying to be brave the best, in his experience. “It's... a whole thing. But for why I'm here?” He smiles a little. “Remember the whole want versus should thing? Yeah. I, uh. Missed you.” Patrick’s heart skips a beat, all on its own, like it wants to play along with the lie.

It doesn’t help that immediately, a hopeful smile sneaks its way onto Jonny’s face, and god, Patrick hadn’t counted on Jonny _smiling_ during the time that they spent together. He really should have thought this true a little more, because clearly, his poor gay heart is not going to survive this if Jonny keeps doing things like that with his face. There’s definitely butterflies happening.

“But my family isn't really on board with the whole liking dudes thing,” he continues, hiding the way his pulse rocketed by biting his lips again. He needs to focus. “I sort of agreed to date a girl so my parents wouldn't kick me out of the family? So I can't really... That's why nobody could know. About us sleeping together.”

Jonny nods gravely, like he understands.

“I missed you too,” he says, uncrossing his arms. “Kind of a lot. Which made me feel even more stupid.”

He shrugs, crossing the room to sit down on his bed, where he pats the space next to him. Patrick takes a step forward and then stops, hovering as a small smile breaks on his face. He knows that nothing about this is real, but for a moment he can’t help but indulge in the thought of Jonny missing him too. Missing him even though Patrick was so awful to him. It’s something that Patrick does a lot – dropping people and getting validation from them missing him afterwards – but this time, he doesn’t need to stay away, not for now.

“It sucks just being dropped like that, you know?” Jonny continues obliviously, and Patrick’s smile slips from his face as quickly as it came. “I mean, I get that that way it was easiest for you, but for me-” Jonny looks up at Patrick quietly. “Well. You could have been honest with me. Like… I thought we were friends, and friends talk, so if there’s stuff going on with you, you can tell me. Especially when it concerns me directly like that.”

Jonny is right. Patrick could have explained the Pat backstory before the summer and used it as an excuse to break things off with Jonny. He could have found an excuse to warn him. But Patrick has never known how to quit anything any other way than cold turkey, and Jonny wasn’t different. Just seeing him now, on his bed, inviting and serious in a completely non-threatening way, Patrick can’t imagine not wanting to bask in his presence. Can’t imagine not being hooked.

Except that he doesn’t want to just look, he wants to touch, too, and when he sits down on the bed, it makes his chest flutter again with anticipation. They’ve fucked on this bed. Quite a lot. It’s not why Patrick came, but- He wonders if Jonny would still want to kiss him. His eyes drop to Jonny’s mouth, and for a heartbeat, he loses track of his thoughts.

“I can’t be friends with you without wanting to touch you,” he says, a little too bluntly, before blinking and looking back up at Jonny. Shit. He flushes, not because of what he said, but because this is too honest, too close to a tap on his actual thoughts. Patrick can’t afford to lose control like that. “Uhm. That’s why it didn’t work out the first time I tried to be straight with you, remember?” He laughs, colour still high on his cheeks. “I’m sorry. That’s not very relevant, I just- you’re right. I could have talked to you. Should have.”

“That’s the thing though, isn’t it?” Jonny says slowly, cheeks colouring ever-so-slightly. “Even if you have to be straight for your family and with your girlfriend, you don’t have to be with me.” Rubbing his neck, he looks at Patrick through long, dark lashes. “If you want to touch me, you can.” His lips are very, very pink. “And you can talk to me. As long as you give me a heads up before you plan to stop doing all that next time. I don’t really enjoy feeling dumb, you know.” He laughs a little.

Patrick might have considered that going to see Jonny could result in them getting to fuck again, yes. He’d be a hypocrite not to admit that. He can’t even deny that it’s not part of the reason why he thinks that time with Jonny might help him cope with withdrawal. Good feelings to make the bad feelings go away, right?

Still, though, he feels awkward at the thought of using Jonny for sex more than he had at the thought of using Jonny for comfort, or even his medical knowledge. Patrick doesn’t want to be _using_ Jonny in that way. Gently, he reaches forward to lace his fingers with Jonny’s, traitorous stomach rolling over with anticipation already. The time that they’ve spent apart should have helped lessen the attraction Patrick feels for Jonny but it hasn’t. It really, really hasn’t.

“I’m not sure TJ would approve, though,” he says, corner of his mouth quirking.

TJ, who is more mad at Patrick than Jonny himself, apparently. Even though Patrick hasn’t even explained why Pat’s family doesn’t want him to be gay. Patrick thought up all these details that he could tell Jonny, and he hasn’t, and it’s not even a good thing because Patrick is increasingly slipping out of character. It feels like Pat doesn’t matter. There’s just Jonny next to him, so close that Patrick can feel his body heat, and the sharp cupid’s bow of Jonny’s mouth asking Patrick to just lean in and take what he wants.

“It’s a good thing then, that I don’t need TJ’s approval,” Jonny says, looking up from their joined hands to meet Patrick’s eyes. “I mean he went ahead and got Lauren’s name tattooed without _my_ approval.”

“Oh my god, he did that?” Patrick asks, grinning a little despite himself. Leaning closer. “That boy truly is a lost cause.”

“So is she.” They’re so close to each other now that Patrick can feel Jonny’s breath on his lips when Jonny laughs. “I mean, didn't you see her wrist? ‘TJ’ right there. When they texted me the picture this summer I genuinely thought I might be having a fever dream.”

“Unbelievable,” Patrick breathes.

He’s far from thinking about TJ and Lauren right now. They’re next door, but Jonny is right, TJ’s approval doesn’t matter. They don’t matter. Jonny looks like he might like Patrick kissing him, still holding Patrick’s hand, and Patrick is just the right amount of buzzed to want to go right in and do it. Their noses brush, and Patrick’s eyes flutter shut, just for a moment, drinking in Jonny’s closeness. It makes something inside his chest ache in the best possible way, to be drawing things out like this.

Jonny seems to have other plans, though, because he huffs.

“Aren’t you gonna kiss me?”

Patrick’s eyes blink open. “Do you want me to?” he asks delicately. He knows the answer, of course, but he can’t help but wonder if this is yet another point of no return. Patrick doesn’t _want_ to hurt Jonny if he doesn’t have to. “Cause this wasn’t a booty-call. You don’t have to feel obligated to fuck me or anything. Or uhm-“ He stops, flushing again. He might have gone a little too far there. “Or even just kiss me.”

Jonny just shrugs, brash and beautiful as always, colour high on his cheeks. “I thought you knew that I liked being your booty call.” Patrick smiles despite himself, helpless and disbelieving. “I mean the sex is fucking amazing and it’s not like you lied to me making me think that you were available or something. I know you have a girlfriend and that you aren’t going to break up with her. There aren’t any false expectations here. I mean-” He lets out a small laugh. “Right now I’m building the expectation that if you ever feel like you have to quit me again, you’d at least give me a heads up. I don’t want to be ghosted again. But under those conditions, yes, I want you to touch me, kiss me, fuck me, all that.”

Patrick licks his lips, pulse going a thousand miles an hour.

“That seems fair,” he says, voice already a little raspy.

Then he closes the last couple of inches between them, slowly, fitting his mouth over Jonny’s in an exhale. Jonny’s mouth is warm, lips chapped and perfectly shaped for Patrick to lick into, soft for Patrick to kiss as much as he wants.

Jason hasn’t kissed Patrick in the past weeks, mostly because had Patrick looked sick and he hadn’t wanted to catch whatever it was that he had, but when he does, it’s also nothing like this. Jason kisses like he wants to win, pushing and demanding. Jonny on the other hand, Jonny lets Patrick kiss him as gently as he feels like, mouth wet and pliant, but kissing _back_ , until the low thrum of arousal and want is making Patrick’s breaths quicken.

When he pulls back, just a few inches, Patrick bites his lips, finding them tingling with Jonny, and grins, lids half-hooded. He feels high in the best fucking way.

“I’m really, really gay,” he tells Jonny, and then leans in again to kiss him, harder this time.

Jonny reaches up to hold Patrick’s face as they kiss, their fingers still tangled together on the bedsheet. Everything is melting together into just this one moment. Pat and Jonny.

Patrick and Jonny.

“I'm very gay too,” Jonny says teasingly in between kisses, teeth only just brushing across Patrick’s bottom lip. His hand drops from Patrick’s face to his waist, toying with the hem of his shirt. “You know, I haven't had sex with anybody in eight weeks.”

“Eight weeks, huh?” Patrick kisses Jonny again, sucking on his bottom lip gently before running his tongue over it, feeling warm everywhere they’re touching – his thigh, his hip, his face. God, touching Jonny is so fucking good. He’s tingling just from the promise of more.

“Been two months since I had sex with anyone I was attracted to,” he offers, giving Jonny a crooked smile before letting his mouth drop to Jonny neck, right under his jaw line.

“Girlfriend not doing it for you, eh?” Jonny asks breathlessly, tilting his head to give Patrick better access. “So maybe this is a booty call after all?”

Patrick just snorts, not needing to dignify the girlfriend question with an answer.

Instead, he pushes Jonny down onto his back on the bed and climbs on top so he can kiss him more, grinning when Jonny interrupts him to joke about needing to go to bed early. Patrick isn’t about to help him with that. Kissing his way down Jonny’s throat, he lets himself get lost in Jonny’s smell and touch a little. There’s things to think about, he knows, but that can be done after the orgasm that Patrick plans on giving Jonny.

He gets one for himself – quite a nice one, too – buried deep inside Jonny’s ass, with his mouth against the outer shell of Jonny’s ear and a silent moan on his lips. Jonny’s long stopped talking about university and needing to be anywhere. When Patrick cleans him up with a couple of tissues, he lets out a soft hum that makes Patrick want to sink right back into his arms and never leave.

Instead, he goes to the bathroom to get himself clean and his own thoughts in order. He has to work tomorrow, too. This is the final stretch to the gala, so he’s pretty much spending every waking hour that he’s not at the gym or puking his guts out at work, making calls and getting into fights with Amelie over the design of the leaflets they’re going to hand out during the gala. Ironically, he’s the one with the flashy ideas, and she’s the one shooting him down about the cost of them.

He still doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do if he hasn’t sorted out this alcohol thing until the gala. The idea of running the night as a drunk makes him cringe internally, because yeah, he’s fucking grossed out at himself, but at the same time, he needs to be at full mental capacity. He’s not sure how long that is going to actually take for him to be clean, even with Jonny’s help. Blowing out a breath, he looks at himself in the mirror, before splashing some water on his face. He needs to talk to Jonny now. As nice as this has been, he can’t let himself be distracted.

He has the words ready on the tip of his tongue when he walks back into the room, ready to get the advice he came here for. When he walks up to the bed, though, Jonny’s head has lolled sideways onto his arm and he’s breathing with his mouth open, chest rising and falling slowly. He’s asleep. Patrick stops where he is and scrunches up his face in frustration. Then he sighs. He’s not going to wake Jonny up for this. Jonny has his first psych rotation tomorrow, and Patrick already took up too much of his evening. Patrick guesses- He’ll just come back tomorrow.

He looks down at Jonny for a little longer, just feeling shitty about the whole situation, wishing there was an easy all-fix. If only Jonny could give him that. He can’t, though, Patrick already knows that much from experience, so one day won’t really make a difference.

Except that Patrick really is fucked about this gala thing.

He scratches the back of his head, sighing for what feels like the hundredth time tonight, and then looks around the room for a piece of paper to write on. He’s not going to sleep here, but he doesn’t want Jonny to wake up alone with no sign from him either. That would be very much not cool of Patrick, and he still needs Jonny to be positively-inclined towards him if he’s going to talk about something as messed up as addiction to him. Even if it’s just a tiny sliver of truth.

 _Went home to sleep_ , he scribbles on a loose sheet of paper he picks up from Jonny’s desk. _Have fun in psych, text me? Maybe I can see you again on the week-end :)_

He adds his phone number in case Jonny deleted his too and signs with his full name before remembering that he’s supposed to be Pat, here. Flushing, he scribbles the name out and writes _Pat_ next to it. He needs to get a grip on that shit.

After a moment of consideration, he plugs Jonny’s phone in to charge and then lays the piece of paper on top of it to make sure Jonny will find it. He closes Jonny’s blinds, too, and then finally makes his way out of the room, praying that he won’t run into TJ on his way to the door.

 

~~~

 

Patrick is tired at work the next day, which is usual, but he’s also feeling really damn good, which is not. He finds himself grinning when no one is watching a couple of times, just thinking about Jonny and getting to touch Jonny again soon. He’s a little disappointed that Jonny only suggested Sunday for meeting again instead of today or Saturday, but he supposes that he’s going to have to wait until then to see Jonny again if he doesn’t want to barge in uninvited into Jonny’s home two days in a row. That would be impolite. And being polite is all part of his scheme to get Jonny to fix him, so he has to be.

The good mood lasts him until about noon.

Then he remembers Clare Roberts and Jason’s refusal to trust Patrick, and he feels sick to his gut. He has to actually excuse himself from the office for a minute, forcing himself to smile at Temi before locking himself into their bathroom with shaky fingers. He has flashes of the woman’s limp body dangling in front of his eyes, except that she’s wearing Jonny’s face, and fuck. _Fuck_. Patrick spits into the sink a couple of times, like maybe it will make him feel less nauseous.

He’s killed countless people before. He doesn’t even care about the woman, wouldn’t have cared if his brain hadn’t decided to equate her to Jonny somewhere along the line. Jonny isn’t her just like Patrick isn’t Alfonso. He isn’t doing anything that could count as betraying the mob. He’s using Jonny to fix himself, because he needs to perform to be an asset to the mob, right? It’s in their benefit. It’s not like they’ve never had people seducing targets for a mission before, even if usually, it’s the women that have to do shit like that.

Patrick is a fucking hypocrite.

He goes out to get himself a bottle of cheap gin and mixes himself drinks all afternoon while he tries to focus on his work. It doesn’t really work all that well. By the end of the evening, he’s too drunk to focus, and he stares at the bottle because _fuck_ , he can’t fucking function right now. Back when he was doing drugs, he would at least try to be sober on the job, but right now it’s seeping into every part of his life, and he doesn’t know what he can do if he’s neither functional when he drinks, nor when he stops.

Of course, using his drinking as an excuse to see Jonny again isn’t any less fucked up because Patrick is struggling. In the end, Patrick goes to sleep wishing he could have everything that he wanted and that things weren’t so hard, feeling tired and worn.

The next day, Patrick tries to work from his bed, finishing up on answering his emails and making a couple of phone calls for Showtime, before switching to making a profile list of the people he needs to talk to most during the gala, with pictures next to them so he can learn it by heart. He calls Jason, too, to ask him to hire a girl to play the Tara part. He manages to stay afloat.

It doesn’t mean that he stays sober. It doesn’t mean that he doesn’t text Jonny back either.

Patrick doesn’t know what he’ll do when he’ll have talked to Jonny and Jonny inevitably won’t have been able to fix him, though. Because isn’t that really what’s going to happen? Patrick has been trying to convince himself that this would work, so damn hard, but Jonny is only human. He doesn’t have magic tricks stored up his sleeve and Patrick been fucked in the head since he was a kid. He probably _can’t_ be fixed. There’s no easy way out of a relapse, and there’s no assurance that it won’t happen again.

Still, though, Patrick wants to try, because it’s the only plan he has, and a shitty plan is better than no plan at all.

He tells himself that it’s okay, that Jonny won’t be a casualty of Patrick’s plan, because Jason will never find out. Patrick isn’t stupid enough to make any sort of comment to Jason that might tip him off. He managed to go to Buffalo fine without anyone noticing. He’s going to keep this a secret, and once the risk starts getting too high again, he’ll just tell Jonny that he needs to break things off because his family is starting to get suspicious. He’s going to make sure that things work out without Jonny ever, ever guessing that he’s been in danger.

It’s a never-ending circle of thoughts that are repeating themselves, and Patrick genuinely doesn’t know how to put an end to them.

 

~~~

 

Patrick comes by Jonny’s place on Sunday morning after church, a bunch of gluten-free snacks that he got from the bakery under his arm for brunch. Patrick thinks that that brunch sounds pretty gay, but he’s up for it, because it’s not like he’s pretending he’s not. No, Patrick is going to sit at a table with Jonny and eat croissants and eggs and catch up, just because he can. Just because he wants to. Just because that way, Jonny will be comfortable with him, and Patrick has enough time to work him over and feel a little more in control of the conversation before bringing up his problems.

“Man, church is so fucking boring,” he tells Jonny when he gets there, and then makes up some lie about going for his parents’ sake, and not because apparently, being catholic makes you a better mobster.

Patrick doesn’t really know where that principle came from, other than the Italian roots of the mob. Jason used to insist that Patrick go to church, though, because that’s something Patrick could actually do, for lack of Italian heritage. It’s a way to make yourself seen. A way to make yourself look good. These days it doesn’t matter as much anymore, because Patrick is integrated enough in the mob as it is, but Patrick tries to go now and then anyway, so he will be seen there by other mobsters and keep up his good reputation. After weeks of being too caught up in his own problems to do his work properly, going to church is the least Patrick can try.

TJ isn’t there yet, so Patrick smiles and sneaks a kiss before putting the food down on the table. Jonny already prepared most of the cooked stuff, and it smells amazing.

“Bacon,” Patrick exclaims happily.

His taste buds don’t really let him enjoy a lot of food, but he does enjoy the crispiness of bacon, and, more than that, he appreciates a good fatty, salty food at the moment. He needs to give his body all the tools it can get for dealing with alcohol after all. He’s been snacking on pickles in between meals to help with that too. Not that he’s drunk anything today yet, other than a sip of wine during mass. He knows he’s going to start feeling jittery soon, but for now, food is good.

“Bacon, yeah,” Jonny says, smiling in that crooked way of his that makes Patrick’s insides go all mushy.

He tells Patrick that TJ is still brooding in bed, because Lauren flew back to New York, and Patrick tells him a little bit about the upcoming gala. Jonny seems genuinely interested in what Patrick is preparing, because he always is, when it comes to Showtime, but it’s still somewhat flattering, given that Patrick has been pouring most of the energy he had into the gala.

Eventually, though, Jonny takes out a small medical pump with a matching arm brace, apologising about needing to take his blood pressure, and Patrick’s mind jumps right back to the time that they spent apart, in which Jonny spent 6 weeks in a hospital. It sounds crazy long, when you think about it, and Patrick can’t even begin to imagine the bills that must have come from it. He stays silent while Jonny measures his blood pressure, watching him handle the buzzing device that seems to be working on its own instead of through a handpump.

“And that’s that,” Jonny says when he’s done, taking the cuff off again and putting the machine back in its cabinet. “Could be worse.”

Immediately, Patrick has a question on the tip of his tongue.

“Can I ask what happened? For the hospital stay to be so long?”

Jonny gives him a wryly amused look. It’s unfairly hot.

“Of course you can ask why I was in the hospital. I’ll even answer. If you tell me about your summer. Did you go to your sister’s wedding like you said you might? Was it nice?”

It’s a good thing that the cheekiness of it makes Patrick’s bark out a delighted laugh, because it allows him to keep grinning like he means it despite the way Jonny asking about Erica’s wedding makes his chest feel like it’s filled with needles. Or possibly impaled on a pointy stick. It makes Patrick retreat back inside of himself, quickly pulling up his walls to leave room for Pat.

“Oh, so you wanna trade information?” he asks teasingly. “I see. Well yes, my good sir, I did in fact attend her wedding. There were people and alcohol and tears – not from me, obviously –“ he winks- “but from everyone else. Erica was stressed as hell, Caleb was happy to have her, so you know, I forgive him for stealing my sister.”

“You went?“ Jonny asks, smiling. “That’s awesome, I bet your sister was excited too, since you live this far away. Even if she was stressed.”

“Yeah, she was delighted,” Patrick says, trying to picture a scene where things happened the way he’s describing them.

It’s not great. Patrick has good imagination, okay, and he can imagine what it would have been like if he had really gone to his sister’s wedding. He doesn’t actually know how she would react because he doesn’t know her all that well anymore, but he hopes that she would have been happy. She must care for him, after all, if she’s so angry at him now. Maybe they could have danced together during the after-celebration, and Patrick- he wouldn’t have made a speech, because he doesn’t deserve that sort of place in front of her actual family and friends, but he would have said enough when it was just the two of them.

“I couldn’t stay for very long, though,” he adds.

“Ah, at least you were there.” Jonny looks genuinely happy at the thought. “I mean if I got along with David and he made time to come to my wedding, even if it was just for an hour, I would be happy.”

“Yeah,” Patrick says, smiling, even though he remembers sitting in the car and not crying, not crying, because he’d wanted to see Erica so bad and there were people like Jonny who just could but didn’t.

Listlessly, he picks up a piece of pastry and slides it into his mouth, making a face at Jonny to get him to laugh instead.

“Well, you held up your end of the bargain,” Jonny says after a short pause. “So, my hospital vacation. Not as much fun as a wedding, I’m pretty sure. I spend six weeks there because I needed a pretty aggressive and thorough course of antibiotics to treat an infective endocarditis.”

Patrick blinks, trying to figure out if the endo thing is a commonly known condition.

There’s a noise, then, coming from TJ’s room, like maybe TJ decided to join the living after all. Jonny turns to glance in its direction.

“I think TJ is up,” he comments, before he seems to remember that Patrick didn’t actually go to medical school himself. “Oh, an endocarditis that’s basically an infection of the inner linings of the heart and often a valve too. That’s what I had.”

“You need to work on your explaining if you’re working with patients, man,” Patrick says with an amused smile. “But okay. Infection, heart, bad. Glad you’re better now.”

“Explaining. Yeah, fuck,” Jonny says, blushing a little. It’s cute. “Okay, let me try again. As I said, I had an infection in my heart, which I am more prone to because of my history. What happens is that clumps of bacteria and cell fragments form in your heart, growing there. They are called vegetations and they can destroy or damage the heart tissue and valves. And that’s bad, like you said. Both because of the damage and because parts of the vegetation can technically break off and travel to other parts of the body and cause a stroke or something.”

Patrick smiles fondly, watching Jonny get increasingly invested in his explanation. It’s a lot of details, but at least he’s slowed down a little, so Patrick can follow him. Jonny isn’t done, though, and maybe that’s an issue, if he only has two modes: fancy words without an explanation, or an explanation that’s too long. Both are likely to overwhelm patients. Right now, though, Patrick just thinks it’s adorable and actually quite informative, so he listens with interest, making the appropriate noises to signify that he’s listening.

“Anyway, I got antibiotics to treat the infection,” Jonny rambles on, giving Patrick a hopeful smile. “I had to get them through an IV for the full cycle because we had to switch to a rather aggressive one that is pretty nephrotoxic. I mean, it can be really bad for your kidneys, so I needed to be monitored the entire time and it was just- Not a good time.”

“Doesn’t sound like it,” Patrick says knowingly when Jonny finishes his explanation. “Sounds like a terrible time, I'm sorry.” Then, because he might as well start dropping hints now, he adds, “For me, it’s my liver that’s probably fucked.”

He makes fingerguns at Jonny too, so that it comes off as sort of a joke. As he’s loading up his plate with everything that looks like it could be good for him and give him protein and fats and shit a second time, TJ’s door finally opens and a disgruntled-looking roommate emerges from his den.

“Morning,” Patrick says cheerfully.

TJ gives him the side-eye, and for a second, it looks like he’s considering not answering. He seems to decide that he wants to be polite, or the bigger person or whatever, though, so he grits out a “Good morning,” back and shuffles to the table to pull a chair for himself that he plops down on.

“Hey, man,” Jonny says empathically, following TJ with his eyes. “Still Lauren’s shirt?”

“I miss her,” TJ just says, tugging a little at the hem off the shirt he’s wearing. It’s a little too tight and short on him with a deep V-neck, reading ‘The Future is Female’ with an American flag on it. “Everything sucks without her.”

“I know,” Jonny says, reaching over to squeeze TJ’s shoulder once. “But look, Pat and I made brunch. Brunch doesn’t suck.”

“Yeah, it does,” TJ grumbles, promptly shoving the bacon Patrick left over onto his plate, looking at it sadly. “Lauren loves bacon.”

“So do you, Pat, and I,” Jonny points out, shooting Patrick a look. Patrick pretends like he doesn’t want to burst out laughing. Or coo at how adorably whipped TJ is. “Don't make bacon into a sad thing.”

“Croissant?” Patrick offers politely.

TJ gives him an accusing look. “Jonny can’t eat these,” he says, taking a croissant from the basket at the same time anyway.

“I know, but there’s gluten and dairy free stuff there for Jonny too, don’t worry.”

“Huh.” TJ eyes Patrick suspiciously, like he doesn’t quite know what to do with the fact that Patrick took Jonny’s food restrictions into account.

Patrick just smiles at him, before putting the basket back down and focussing on his plate again. He could start a conversation with TJ right now, or even with Jonny and let TJ wake up while they do, but he need to ease into things if he wants TJ to not hate him anymore, so he just eats for a little while and waits for them to start talking on their own. Patrick will introduce himself into the conversation once TJ isn’t quite so defensive towards him anymore.

And Brunch does go well enough, in Patrick’s opinion. TJ actually loosens up during the course of it, allowing Patrick to involve him in conversation and actually get a couple of laughs out of him. TJ doesn’t laugh at Jonny’s jokes, though, looking like he’s doing on principle even if at a couple of points the corners of his mouth are twitching. Jonny pretends to look offended every time. It’s nice. It’s _too_ nice.

Patrick is feeling too at ease between the two of them, eating food in broad daylight and joking around. He’s technically allowed to have friends, that’s true, but being friends with someone he also likes to fuck is a completely different matter. Right now, it feels like the past two months haven’t happened at all and Patrick is still just pretending that he can keep the outside world away from his Jonny bubble. It feels like the bubble is quickly growing back, and Patrick is struggling to keep separated which him he’s putting in there with them.

It’s difficult, because of that, making Patrick more aware of his surroundings as time goes on. The steady pressure behind his skull that always comes with the day getting later builds up too, reminding him that maybe he should have had a drink after all, and maybe he should have slept more instead of counting on brunch to fulfil all of his bodily needs.

Eventually, they make it through all the food on the table, and TJ excuses himself, making Patrick snort.

“Guess he didn’t want to do the dishes,” he comments, joining Jonny at the sink and turning the faucet on to start cleaning up.

It’s nice to have something to do with his hands. It would be even nicer if he could touch Jonny, though. Patrick is starting to feel stretched thin, and he hates it, hates recognising the signs so well now that he’s aware of it when he managed months living like this and never noticing that this wasn’t normal. It’s always easy to blame feeling bad on his insomnia, after all.

“So,” Jonny says, suddenly, like he’d been meaning to earlier and was waiting for TJ to exit the room to ask, “what you said about your liver.” He gestures to his own abdomen. “Were you joking or is there actually something going on?”

Patrick’s freezes.

His first instinct is to pretend like there’s nothing wrong with that question, maybe laugh, suppress his genuine reactions. Fuck. He hadn’t expected Jonny to start asking questions this soon.

“Why are you pointing at your stomach?” he asks, raising an eyebrow, just to buy time.

His pulse feels like it’s racing faster than a highway, and it’s not pleasant, this time.

“Because that’s where-” Jonny starts, halting in the middle of the sentence. “I meant here,” he says gesturing to the actual position of the liver, this time on Patrick’s body, higher up. “You know, that’s where the liver is. And I asked you about it. So.”

Jonny is more perceptive than Patrick gave him credit for, maybe. Maybe that’s what Patrick needs to believe, and not that he somehow fucked up and gave it away with his body language and a single comment. It’s not a comment Jonny should have picked up on. Not immediately, not to the point of asking about it once they were alone again. Patrick looks at the sink and rubs the sponge over the first plate, squeezing as tightly as he can without it showing.

Unless Jonny manages to read that too and Patrick has somehow lost his ability to act in front of him. That would be bad.

“You did.”

He finishes cleaning the plate and moves on to the next one, not quite knowing what to say. Thrown off by this turn of events. He planned this out. He came here to talk about this specifically, to Jonny. This should be a good thing, because it’s easing Patrick’s way into the conversation without making it look like he sought Jonny out for advice on alcoholism.

And yet, Patrick feels petrified.

He was supposed to be in control here. Pretend to be someone he’s not, charm Jonny and his roommate to make things easier so he could sneak in questions that would apply to Pat _and_ him, without mentioning all the irrelevant him-bits.

He finishes washing the second plate, puts it down. He needs to say something. God, he’s just making this awkward, and he doesn’t know _how_ he’s supposed not to be. He can’t even play it cool because that wouldn’t be in character either, but how do you play someone being uncomfortable when you’re uncomfortable yourself and have it be fake? How does that work?

“Sorry,” he mumbles after a moment, grabbing the third plate. “I, uh. Actually do. Have something going on.” He moves on to the cutlery. “Can we just- wait until TJ can’t walk in on us any second to talk about it?”

He gives Jonny a hesitant look. Maybe that’s what he needs. Just a couple of seconds more to get his shit together and talk to Jonny again.

Jonny frowns.

“He’s playing counterstrike,” he says, confused. “He’s not gonna- But we can go to my room, if you want to? After we’re done with-” He nods towards the dishes. “I mean, if you want to talk. You brought it up, so I thought-”

Again, he shrugs. The awkwardness is so thick in the air that you could cut it with a knife.

“Yeah but-“

Patrick looks down at the sink again. If TJ walked in while he was talking about his addictions, Patrick thinks that he might throw up. Or stab him. Just the risk of it is too much.

“You’re right,” he says quietly. He did bring up the liver thing. He just hadn’t expected it to go the way it did. With a soapy hand, he rubs at his clavicle, soaking the fabric of his button-up. “Let’s just finish this, yeah? And then we can go to your room. I do want to talk to you.”

Patrick is not going to chicken out of this just because the topic makes him uncomfortable. He’s clearly out of his depth, and that’s just how it’s going to be. How talking about this was always going to be. And after all, Patrick is literally, selfishly risking Jonny’s safety so that he can somehow feel better about his alcohol problem. Jonny deserves at least an explanation.

They finish washing the dishes in silence, only the sound of the cutlery clinking in the kitchen, and Patrick feels more alone than he ever has before in Jonny’s presence. Somehow, he made things bad again. The drugs always do – why should it be different with this? Suddenly, Patrick isn’t sure anymore if Jonny will want to help him after all. He already isn’t touching him now, so why should he after finding out?

He still gives Jonny a small smile once the dishes are done, and then leads the way to Jonny’s bedroom, where he sits down on the bed and crosses his legs under him. He’d meant to play this conversation as someone else, but now that it’s happening, he’s not sure he’ll be able to distance himself from the conversation like that. His skin is crawling with it. With the truth of it. Maybe there’s no point in pretending here anyway. Patrick will just have to give Jonny the necessary facts, straight-up, and then see what Jonny has to say about them.

Just because Patrick doesn’t want to say the words doesn’t mean he can’t talk. Patrick is an expert at doing things that he hates, after all.

Jonny joins him on the bed, looking unsure and confused. He gives Patrick’s thigh a small nudge and a tentative smile, and Patrick’s eyes flicker up to him, swallowing thickly. He just needs to say the words.

“Did you know that the liver is the second largest organ of the human body, after the skin?” Jonny asks. “It’s pretty heavy. On average 1.5 kilograms. And it’s like- It’s a really amazing organ. It’s the only one that regenerates itself. As long as 25 percent of your liver are still intact it can regrow to the way it was, and it does that super fast too. That’s why we can do live liver donations and unlike with kidneys, you aren’t missing an organ for the rest of your life, you just miss a part of it for a while. I mean, the donor gives 40 to 60 percent of their liver and eight weeks later both donor and recipient have pretty much an entire liver for themselves. That’s pretty amazing, right?“

Patrick just looks at Jonny, thought process stopped dead in its tracks as he tries to process the information Jonny just threw at him.

“Really?”

It does sound amazing, when Jonny frames it like that. And really, Patrick has enough long-term problems from smoking crack as it is – like his insomnia, or the fact that he can’t taste food and doesn’t feel hungry, or how his organs could go into failure pretty much every other day. Like his kidneys for example, which Jonny is saying don’t grown back on their own. He’s had to get his teeth whitened when he was eighteen. Patrick hasn’t researched the long-term effects of alcoholism, because he’s not that far into the thought process, but it’s a relief all the same to think that maybe, this won’t fuck him up for life.  

Maybe that’s why his mom managed to drink for years on end without ending up in the hospital herself. Hell, she might still be drinking to this day and using the money he sends her for it.

“That’s good to know,” he tells Jonny, and then goes quiet again. He still needs to get rid of the problem _now_ if he wants long-term effects to matter. Which is why he’s here. He clears his throat. “So let’s assume I was drinking alcohol every day for a year.” He glances up at Jonny, scanning his face for a reaction. “There would be no long-term consequences?”

“Well, that depends,” Jonny says quietly.

He pauses, rubbing his neck as he seems to go through the information he has collected inside his brain. Despite the context, despite himself, Patrick can’t help but be impressed. _Fuck_ Jonny is smart. His memory is fucking amazing, for him to be able to talk like a medical textbook without any preparation whatsoever. Patrick is a little bit in love.

“It depends on how much and what kind of alcohol you were drinking every day, as well as your overall health and life style,” Jonny says slowly. “But one of the effects that happens pretty quickly with regular and excessive drinking is vitamin deficiency. Like vitamin B and B12 for example. Your body needs those to deal with the alcohol, when actually it sort of originally needs them to convert food into energy, which is why when you develop a deficiency you end up feeling fatigued, get headaches, feel tired, get pale skin, all that.”

He looks at Patrick carefully, like he’s scanning Patrick’s face for signs of what he’s describing. Patrick tries not to look too guilty, very well aware that he’s pale, that his eyes are bloodshot, that he’s got dark circles for days. And that’s after having gone back to drinking for the past six days. He looked much worse last week.

“The alcohol can also just keep your body from absorbing the vitamins,” Jonny continues. “Even moderate drinking can cause inflammations of the stomach, which means it can’t produce what it needs to absorb nutrients and stuff that it usually would, which leads to a lack of, as I said, for example vitamin B12 which increases the risk of stuff like heart attacks or strokes. Which aren’t fun.”

Again, he gives Patrick a careful look, adjusting his hand’s position on the bed until his pinky finger slightly brushes against Patrick’s.

“There’s more stuff too,” Jonny says, because of course there is. Patrick’s stomach plummets as he watches Jonny rub his neck. “Like liver damage. It’s the most likely and most common. Drinking too much and too often leads to inflammations of the liver, and that eventually leads to scarring which can end in cirrhosis or alcoholic hepatitis or stuff like that. But you are young, Pat. And the liver is incredibly regenerative, so if you have a problem but get it handled now there is a good chance of your body being able to recover. I mean, I don’t know how much and for how long you’ve been drinking, hypothetically, but your age works in your favour. You might avoid all the long-term consequences like increased risk of cancer in certain organs or the liver shit or damage to your brain or any of the other stuff. If you’d already been drinking heavily for – I don’t know – ten years, it’d be different, but even then, stopping now could still prevent stuff.”

Patrick presses his lips tightly together, exhaling. So the liver isn’t a magical organ that will fix itself then. That figures. It’s not like Patrick is expecting to live past 40 anyway.

“Right,” he says, running a hand through his hair. “Okay then.”

He guesses that it doesn’t really matter at this point. Things are the way they are, he fucked up, he’s going to pay for it eventually. Right now, it’s not what he needs to focus on. Because apparently, and unsurprisingly, letting things go on for longer won’t do him any good in the long-term either. He looks at Jonny, feeling cold and hopeless. Jonny’s playing doctor with him right now. Patrick supposes that he should take advantage of that and just ask his questions then.

“I don’t know how long it’s been,” he clarifies, shrugging. “I mean, I don’t know how long it’s been bad. I didn’t notice that it was a problem until recently.”

He closes his eyes again for a few seconds. It’s funny how Jonny described symptoms that make up pretty much every day of Patrick’s life. The headache is already there, slowly thrumming under his temples. Patrick raises one of his hands, just holding it out and watching it. With nothing to do and nothing to support it, the shakiness in it quickly becomes obvious.

“I haven’t had anything to drink today,” he says matter-of-factly. His head hurts. “I can hold on another couple hours, maybe. If I wait longer it’s going to get worse.” He puts the hand back down in his lap, glancing at the clock next to the bed. “I tried to stop but it’s not working.”

Jonny’s eyes are dark and intense as they focus on Patrick. “But you realized that it’s a problem.” He reaches out to wrap his hand around Patrick’s, squeezing it gently. The one that had been trembling a moment ago. “That’s so important, and it’s a start. And you are trying to change something. That’s amazing. That’s already a very hard thing to do.”

Patrick jumps a little from the unexpected contact, eyes flickering to Jonny’s face in surprise. This isn’t the reaction he had been expecting by telling Jonny that he didn’t know how to stop being a drunk. Maybe he wasn’t expecting straight-up disgust – Jonny wouldn’t be so crass as to show that – but he’d thought that Jonny would at least keep fact-dropping on him. Maybe talk about what Patrick can do to get rid of the problem.

Instead, though, there’s Jonny’s hand, warm in his, and Patrick can’t help by squeeze back a little, watching Jonny’s face carefully. Jonny is talking about realising the problem, pointing out how hard it is to change, and it’s true, all of it. That it’s important and that it’s hard. It’s far from amazing, though, because Patrick isn’t amazing right now. He’s weak, he messed up again, and he needs to get a grip before fucking the rest of his life up like he’s done so many times before.

“But I can’t make it stop,” he says. “And I need to.” He squeezes Jonny’s hand again, tighter, because it’s the only part of Jonny he can hold on to right now. “You know things, right? How do I do this without messing up my work? I just- can’t have anyone find out.” He chews on his bottom lip pitifully. It feels like a failure not just to have fallen into this hell circle again, not just to be as messed up as his mom, but also that he can’t even fix it on his own. “Did you have classes on that? On how to manage withdrawal?”

“But you _can_ make it stop,” Jonny says, looking at Patrick intently. “That it didn’t work until now, doesn’t mean you can’t.” He squeezes Patrick’s hand right back, brushing his thumb over Patrick’s knuckles. It makes Patrick’s heart jump painfully between his ribs. “I’ve had lectures about alcoholism. And one point I remember is that you have to try to keep in mind that it’s your choice. Drinking, not drinking, it’s up to you. You aren’t supposed to make the alcohol and your addiction to it into this big bad unbeatable monster in your head, which is not- I’m not trying to say that it isn’t hard, or that needing more than one attempt proves weakness. It’s supposed to be encouraging, I think. Reminding yourself that this isn’t something you can’t change.”

Patrick presses his lips together tightly. He knows that. He knows that he’s supposed to be the one controlling all of this. It’s him getting addicted to shit over and over, making the wrong choices until they snowball and he’s supposed to just decide to make things stop. He’s just- he’s here to ask for help, okay? He tried, it’s not working, and something a little more concrete than just “choosing” to stop would be great, in his opinion.

It helps a little that Jonny is still holding his hand, thumb brushing over Patrick’s knuckles gently. Jonny still hasn’t kicked him out, and maybe him saying all of this, about choice and believing that he can do it means that he hasn’t really realised it yet. He doesn’t get that Patrick is a drunk, because right now, Patrick looks put together and sober. The disgust and pity will come later, when he thinks about it more, or if Patrick just stays here and keep not drinking until he’s puking.

It’s funny really. He’s throwing up either way – whether he’s drinking or not. That probably doesn’t help with absorbing shit either. He’s going to have to look up how to counter the deficiencies he probably has now and try not to lose all of the vitamins in the basin of a toilet.

“I’m guessing, when you say you can’t have anyone know, that excludes any kind of inpatient treatment, or rehab, right?” Jonny asks when Patrick doesn’t reply immediately. Immediately, Patrick shakes his head, because- no. Just no. He can’t let _anyone_ find out. “Because that could help you, make the whole thing safer and maybe even easier. But if you want to do it at home, there are ways to do that too. But you shouldn’t do it alone. That’s not safe.”

Patrick swallows. “That’s how I’ve always done it. Why isn’t it safe?”

“Because the withdrawal symptoms can get pretty bad,” Jonny says slowly. “You know because there’s not just a psychological addiction, but a physical one as well. There could be hallucinations involving sight, hearing, and touch, as well as confusion, or even seizures. And that’s not as bad as it can get. I mean tremors, sweating, fevers, nausea, that’s all awful and I wouldn’t wish that on anyone, but alcohol withdrawal can also cause something called delirium tremens, have you ever heard of that?”

Patrick shakes his head slowly.

“I’ve had a couple seizures before, though. In senior year of high school.”

It had been after Patrick’s overdose, back in Buffalo, and he’d managed to be alone for one of the seizures. He thinks there was a second time, at night, because he vaguely remembers Erica freaking out and trying to shake him awake, and being on the floor. It didn’t happen again after that time, though, he’s certain, so it’s not like that means he’s prone to it or anything. Just that his brain really got fucked good when he was a teenager.

“You had seizures before?” Jonny asks, searching Patrick’s face. He looks genuinely concerned. It makes Patrick want to avert his eyes. “That’s awful. You were what? 17? Can I ask what happened, why you had the seizures?”

“Yeah,” Patrick says, clearing his throat awkwardly. It’s both an answer to the age question, and to whether Jonny can ask.

Patrick can admit to having a history with addiction. It’s relevant information, as long as he doesn’t have to go into detail about any of it. He licks his lips, feeling how dry they are and wishing despite his better judgement they were having this conversation over a drink. His head hurts.

“Withdrawal,” he explains, but doesn’t say anything more than that.

“Okay,” Jonny says. There’s a pause, like he’s waiting for Patrick to say more, but Patrick won’t. Can’t. “So. Delirium tremens. That’s something that can happen if you’ve been drinking a lot for a long period of time. Usually. It’s- It’s something people can die of. Usually because of their body temperature getting too high, or heart rhythm abnormalities, cardiac arrest, or seizure related complications. I’m not saying that has to happen or that it’s likely, it’s just- It’s a risk that exists, so I-”

He hesitates for a moment. He looks at Patrick like he’s trying to puzzle him out, again, and Patrick looks back, unsure of what it is that Jonny is looking for this time. He just feels sick and scared. He hates withdrawal so much. And now, apparently, it can kill him too. It’s like there’s no way to escape the addiction train once you’re on board, because the fall might just cost you more than you’re ready to give. And Patrick keeps stumbling onto the next train every time, bruised and bloody from his last fall.

“I could watch out for you,” Jonny says, just like that.

“Oh,” Patrick says, voice quiet.

For a second there, he genuinely has to blink away the moisture from his eyes. His chest feels all sorts of tight and constricted, from emotions Patrick doesn’t know how to deal with. He swallows, blinking hard so he doesn’t start crying or embarrass himself any further.

Patrick has to remind himself that he came here _expecting_ Jonny to offer his help, because he knew that Jonny was that kind of person. Hearing it in person, he can’t believe that he could have seriously expected this of Jonny, like any sane person would be this kind. This is exactly why Patrick thought that Jonny had to be a fake at the beginning. Nobody is that good without any ulterior motives, it’s just not possible.

“You don’t have to,” he says, voice threateningly choked up, and then thinks _Idiot_. He’s supposed to accept Jonny’s help, he _wants_ Jonny help. He’s not going to mess this up because he’s getting feelings. “I mean, yes, please. If you don’t mind.”

Jonny seems decidedly flustered too, face flushed as he rubs his neck, but also hopeful.

“I mean, I’m not a doctor yet, and I do have responsibilities but I could do my best to help you, if you wanted that. I could also- If you don’t want to quit cold turkey because you can’t take time off from your security gig or something or because you want to avoid withdrawal symptoms getting too bad, we could also see if we can come up with a plan to first reduce your alcohol intake? To get your body used to less and less so the reaction to quitting all together won’t be too severe?” Again, he squeezes Patrick’s hand. “I don’t know what you meant when you said that you’ve always done it alone. I don’t know how you’ve done things, but, uhm, I’ll do my best to help and support you. If that’s what you want.”

Patrick, really, really wants to kiss him.

“I need to work this week,” he says, pulling himself together at best he can. “I can’t take time off just because of this shit. So I just-“ He sighs, running a shaky hand through his hair. “A withdrawal plan could be good? If that can help with managing the symptoms? Cold turkey is easier, but I _can’t_.”

Jonny nods empathically. “Okay, we can do that. We’ll work on a plan for you to reduce your drinking. I can also look up some stuff. You should definitely take certain vitamin supplements, and drinks with electrolytes too, also you should eat healthy, and I can talk to my prof if there’s a way to get my hands on one of these drugs that help reduce the cravings for alcohol. But first, how much do you drink daily, or are you- Are you more of a binge drinker?”

Jonny reaches out to brush Patrick’s hair back over Patrick’s ear, too gentle to be true, and Patrick just- his breath catches. It makes some of what Jonny is saying go straight over Patrick’s head, too busy blinking at Jonny to focus on the complicated words. He has to shake himself, frowning, to get his brain back on track. That’s something that’s been an issue, recently. Staying focussed, even for non-Jonny things. It’s not great. Except that shaking his head makes the migraine worse, and Patrick has to press a hand to his temple for a second until the worst of the thrumming has passed.

“How much… do I drink?” he repeats, and when Jonny nods, he mirrors the movement. “Right.” He bites his lips. If he wasn’t so busy feeling miserable already, he would probably be embarrassed about this. “I’ve been binge-drinking a lot these past weeks? But before that, maybe five beers a day? More if I drink with people when I’m going out, or having dinner with people and stuff.”

“Okay,” Jonny says slowly. “Five beers a day isn’t actually that bad. Factoring in the binge drinking though… I can work with that. But- are you okay?”

Patrick nods, smiling weakly. “I’m fine.”

Jonny gives him a dubious look. Patrick’s heart aches. He doesn’t understand why Jonny is acting like he cares so much about Patrick when this is what they’re talking about, and honestly, he’s too tired to care. He wants to drink something and lie down for a while.

“Do you want to take a break?” Jonny offers, like he read Patrick’s thoughts. “I need to research some stuff anyway.”

“I’m-“ Patrick looks at him helplessly. “Yeah. If you don’t mind. And thank you. Thank you so much for doing this.” Jonny flushes, looking pleased with himself despite the still-worried look on his face. It makes Patrick hopeful, despite all reasonable evidence. Feeling reckless, he asks, “Can I rest my head in your lap? While you do your research? Or if you wanna fuck around on your computer that’s cool too. You can take a break too.”

“Oh no, I’m good,” Jonny assures him immediately, but he smiles at Patrick’s suggestion, like he’s happy to provide a lap for Patrick too.

When Patrick does lie down, nose brushing against the fabric of Jonny’s chinos, he lets out a silent exhale and closes his eyes.

When Jonny’s hand slips into his hair, making small, stroking motions against Patrick’s scalp as Jonny fiddles with his phone in his other hand, the exhale turns into a small moan, and fuck. Patrick never wants Jonny to finish researching if he can just scratch Patrick’s head like this forever. Jonny’s chuckle is like a low rumble that reverberates through Patrick’s head. Patrick lets himself go, and stops thinking for a little while.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter warnings:**  
>  \- Alcoholism: the MC realises that he has an alcohol problem. This leads to him binge-drinking to a dangerous amount and then attempting to quit cold-turkey on his own, but failing. He then asks help from Jonny, who is a med student but doesn't have the qualifications to care for Patrick. He explains a lot of the medical consequences of over-drinking and of withdrawal.  
> \- Mention of multiple health consequences of drinking and addiction, such as seizures.  
> \- Unsafe driving: don't drink and drive, kids!!  
> \- Unhealthy relationship stuff: Patrick goes back to Jonny with the full intention to use him for his own benefit, thus endangering his safety, and planning to hurt him emotionally by leaving at the end of this. You can love him anyway (I certainly do) but it's still careless and definitely not romantic.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm on [Tumblr](http://eubiass.tumblr.com/)
> 
>  **Warnings:**  
>  \- Addiction: Patrick does not have any specific drug relapses in this story, but he uses alcohol as a substitute drug, which will be thoroughly addressed.  
> \- Cheating: This is a strong theme throughout this entire story. Patrick is in a relationship when he meets Jonny, and he has no plans on leaving it. Jonny is aware of this (but only this), and considers that it's Patrick's problem, not his.  
> \- Abusive relationship: The relationship Patrick is in is not one that he can leave, whether he wants to or not, and he is frequently verbally (and sometimes physically) abused.  
> \- Dubcon: Same thing as the abusive relationship. Patrick can't willingly leave the relationship he's in, which makes whatever consent he pretends to give superfluous.
> 
> All comments are widely appreciated :)


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